[Land-speed] Towing a Race car

[Skip Higginbotham]

Ed,

Our 5th wheel has roughly 1600 lbs on the pin.....enough to keep the 
back tires on the road....and it pulls beautifully. Total wight is 
about 11K.  Race car trailer (Goose neck) has about 2000 on the pin 
and 15K total.

Skip



At 07:26 PM 6/2/2009, Ed Weldon wrote:
>John/Skip -- I think I share Skip's skepticism.  The physics of the
>situation suggests to me that the weight on the 5th wheel should be a
>significant amount to give the rear wheels of the tow vehicle extra sidewise
>traction to resist the sideways component of trailer deceleration forces
>whenever slowing down.  With no 5th wheel experience I personally have no
>good idea of how much down force at the 5th wheel is enough.  But it strikes
>me that in the case of an 18 wheeler truck that 5th wheel down force could
>be close to half the weight of the trailer.  And still the truckers have
>jackknife accidents.  So it seems that the loading of a 5th wheel trailer
>ought to be as much as the tow vehicle can safely handle considering all
>aspects of the tow vehicle's operational characteristics.
>Ed Weldon
>
>----- Original Message -----
>From: "Skip Higginbotham" <saltrat at pahrump.com>
>To: "John Burk" <joyseydevil at comcast.net>; "LandSpeed List"
><Land-speed at autox.team.net>
>Sent: Tuesday, June 02, 2009 4:42 PM
>Subject: Re: [Land-speed] Towing a Race car
>
>
> > UhhHUH, really?..................