Safe Towing — How To Make Sure Your Hitch Is The Right Height For Your Trailer
It’s time to start planning for the summer, and for many people, that’s going to involve towing.
You may be planning to tow your boat trailer to the beach, your camper to the woods, or a trailer full of belongings to a new home — whatever you plan to tow, it’s important to make sure you have it set up safely.
Towing a trailer isn’t as difficult as it might seem, but it is important to make sure everything is attached properly before you get started.
More than just making sure the connections are secure, you need to be certain that your trailer and your hitch are at the right height, or it could turn your trip into a nightmare.
Why It Matters
What difference can a couple of inches in height really make?
A lot more than you might think if you haven’t ever towed a poorly adjusted load before.
If your hitch is too low for your trailer it can put a lot of strain on the back of your car or truck, and you might end up with a damaged back bumper.
It will also cause your front tires to have less contact with the ground, which will reduce their traction, making it harder for you to steer and control your vehicle.
Having a trailer hitch that’s too high isn’t good either, as it will cause your trailer to tilt backward, and make it more likely to sway as you’re driving.
That may not sound so bad, but it can be quite dangerous once your trailer starts swinging back and forth, and it can throw around whatever’s inside as well.
The goal is to make the height of your hitch match the height of the receiver on your trailer — and there are two primary ways to go about that.
There are a wide variety of hitches available with different “rises” and “drops” that make them taller or shorter — and you can certainly find one that will have the ball mount on the hitch match your trailer.
You’ll want to measure from the ground to the bottom of the trailer’s couple, then from the ground to the top of your vehicle’s hitch receiver — subtract the height of the receiver from the height of the coupler.
If your answer is a positive number, you need to raise your hitch — if the answer is negative, you need to lower it.
You can find a hitch with a drop or rise of the same amount as your result, and you’re good to go for that vehicle and trailer combo.
Make sure your measurements are correct, or you’ll have a hitch that’s no good for you and need to make a second trip to try again.
The Other Way
The second way to make sure your height is correct is a little easier, and a lot more versatile.
We live in an age of wonders, and that includes adjustable hitches — so you can easily move your hitch height up or down by as much as 9" with a top-notch model.
That’s enough adjustment to tow just about anything without worrying about finding a perfectly sized hitch — and you don’t need to carry multiples around if you plan to tow different trailers.
With these hitches, you can either measure and do the math — or line them up and adjust by eye until they’re level.
Don’t worry if you don’t get it right the first time — they’re easy to adjust, you just have to pull a pin and try again — just make sure your trailer is level before you head out.
Getting your trailer securely and correctly attached is the most important part of towing — and with the right hitch, that’s easy.
