Springdale Weight/Balance Issue

[Ryan J]

Is anyone having trouble balancing gross weight/tongue weight with their Springdale TT?
I have a 2021 Springdale 295BH, towing with a 2022 F250 Diesel using a Curt TruTrack 15K/1500 weight distribution hitch with square bars. With the hitch adjusted for full forward distribution, I CANNOT get the front end of the truck down or "squat" out of the rear end. And quite honestly this makes for an incredibly stiff setup and a very bumpy/jarring ride. The bars almost appear to be bowed under the force, There's a considerable amount of "porpusing" and an absolutely scary amount of trailer rear-end sway in even the slightest wind.
The trailer specs are as follows:
Length 33.5 ft
Dry wt. 6999 lbs
Tongue wt. 955 lbs
So DRY, we have 13.6% on the tongue (Most manufacturers recommend 10-15%) Now consider that the freshwater tank (52gal) is up front, battery, 2 propane tanks, as is most of the storage inside, it seems like a LOT of forward weight that I can't really do anything about. As it stands right now, I am absolutely not comfortable towing greater than 65mph, sometimes even slower depending on conditions. I don't need to be going 90, but regardless this seems like a lot of inherent tongue weight.
Anybody having similar issues or have any insight?

[JRTJH]

It sounds like the hitch height and hitch head angle are not properly adjusted. They work together to both lift the trailer tongue and to transfer weight to the front axle of the tow vehicle/trailer axles. If your hitch height is too low, trying to raise the trailer tongue to "level" will put too much weight on the front axle, lifting the rear of the tow vehicle, causing the WD bars to increase tension which produces bounce. That bounce is likely the "porposing" you feel.

If the height is correct, but the head tilt angle is wrong, you either can not get enough tension so there's inadequate weight transfer to the front axle or you have so much tension that you induce porposing. Both can set up sway and trailer control issues.

If you have the CURT installation manual, steps 5, 6 and 17 are where you want to insure you are correctly set up. If you don't have the CURT installation manual, you can download it here: https://assets.curtmfg.com/masterlib.../17501_INS.pdf

I'd start by resetting/readjusting your hitch setup, then tow to a CAT scale and get some accurate weights on the rig. You will want to pull onto the CAT scale, front truck axle on pad 1, rear truck axle on pad 2 and trailer axles on pad 3. Get a weight, then, without moving the rig, remove the tension on the WD bars, get back in the truck and get a second weight. Then tow off the scale, unhitch the trailer, drive the truck back on the scale, front axle on pad 1 rear axle on pad 2 (as close as you can get to where you were in the first weights) and get a third weight.

With those three weight slips you can determine the total rig weight, the trailer tongue weight, the amount of tongue weight transferred fore/aft, the truck weight and the trailer weight.

[Ryan J]

Originally Posted by JRTJH

It sounds like the hitch height and hitch head angle are not properly adjusted. They work together to both lift the trailer tongue and to transfer weight to the front axle of the tow vehicle/trailer axles. If your hitch height is too low, trying to raise the trailer tongue to "level" will put too much weight on the front axle, lifting the rear of the tow vehicle, causing the WD bars to increase tension which produces bounce. That bounce is likely the "porposing" you feel.

If the height is correct, but the head tilt angle is wrong, you either can not get enough tension so there's inadequate weight transfer to the front axle or you have so much tension that you induce porposing. Both can set up sway and trailer control issues.

If you have the CURT installation manual, steps 5, 6 and 17 are where you want to insure you are correctly set up. If you don't have the CURT installation manual, you can download it here: https://assets.curtmfg.com/masterlib.../17501_INS.pdf

I'd start by resetting/readjusting your hitch setup, then tow to a CAT scale and get some accurate weights on the rig. You will want to pull onto the CAT scale, front truck axle on pad 1, rear truck axle on pad 2 and trailer axles on pad 3. Get a weight, then, without moving the rig, remove the tension on the WD bars, get back in the truck and get a second weight. Then tow off the scale, unhitch the trailer, drive the truck back on the scale, front axle on pad 1 rear axle on pad 2 (as close as you can get to where you were in the first weights) and get a third weight.

With those three weight slips you can determine the total rig weight, the trailer tongue weight, the amount of tongue weight transferred fore/aft, the truck weight and the trailer weight.

JRTJH thanks for the reply.
I was very carefull while installing the hitch to make sure I did it properly. I even started completely over at one point to try to rectify the issue, and experimented slightly low and slightly high just to see what changes I may notice. I guess it's also a good time to say this isn't my first travel trailer and I'm not at all new to towing
I'm thinking a trip to the scales will be my next step.
I'm still fairly convinced there's way too much weight on the tongue of the trailer. By my rough calculations, after adding freshwater, clothes, etc., I wouldn't be surprised to learn there's 18-19% of GVW on the tongue! I don't think any hitch is going to solve that problem.

In my experience with forums, someone is bound to reply with something like "you have too much weight in the front! empty your tanks and store your clothes and food in the bathroom." So before it happens let me just say I don't consider that a realistic solution haha.

That's why I was curious if any other Springdale owners were having similar issues.

[Ryan J]

Originally Posted by JRTJH

I has similar issues with a 1993 Holiday Rambler. It was 35' long, 10K GVW and I was towing it with a 99 SuperDuty diesel. I couldn't keep it in the lane above 60MPH. I "knew for sure" that I'd set up the trailer hitch properly, after all, I'd been towing for 20 years and knew what I was doing....

I had a friend that kept telling me to readjust my hitch head angle... Nah, I knew it was OK....

Then, one Saturday, he came over, he set up the hitch while I kept telling him he was wasting his time... Then, we took it for a test tow and guess what.....

Yep. It towed perfectly after that.....

So, good luck with knowing that your hitch is set up properly.....

Well I'm not relying on previous towing experience to know I set the hitch up properly, and didn't mean for that statement to imply that I know all there is to know about hitches and towing, just that I'm not a newbie trying to hook my brand new $XXXXXX 10,000 lb trailer to a Ford expedition!
I followed the instructions to the letter. Twice, actually (as I said in my previous reply).

As I also mentioned earlier, when the "proper" setup of the hitch didn't help, I experimented with other ball heights. I didn't mention before that I also experimented with different head angles. As it's set now, the rear squats 1-1/2 inches from baseline and the front is up 1 inch. This is with the head tilted fully back.
The only head adjustment I could make would be tilting forward a bit, which would relieve tension and thus increase rear squat and front end rise.
The actual appearance of rear squat/front rise isn't really the issue. It's the sway and porposing that get my butt all clinched up! Relieving tension on the WD hitch certainly makes both of those phenomena worse.

[Javi]

I'm thinking that you might need some heavier bars if you plan on towing with the fresh water tank full.
That's a lot of tongue weight, you might also consider a set of airbags.

If the bars are too light you can adjust until you are blue in the face and you'll never get it to tow correctly.

[flybouy]

I think the first thing you need to do is visit a scale and see where you are loaded up. The type of squate you are describing is what I get if I don’t connect my WDH bars. My truck has an 8' bed, a fibergalss cap, and probably 200 lbs. of tools. I use a SherLine tongue scale, especially if I carry a full tank of fresh water (very rarely).

My tongue weight can vary from around 1,100 lbs to nearly 1,500 depending on loading. On some long trips I'll load luggage, case of bottled water, etc on the floor over the axles. I also have air bags on the truck, jot to level the truck but to keep the hitch from dragging in the dip at the end of our driveway. I cantrol the airbags from the drivers position and adjusting the air pressure while driving can help reduce the proposing on some roads.