Towing stability. Most bang for the buck?

[Davexxxx]

Note i had never driven a truck nor towed anything in my life until I got this. The big lesson I learned is to make sure sway control is off on my first trip as it seemed to counteraxt the equalizer sway control.

I'd read that about the sway control before.

I have pretty extensive towing experience, from before I had a license on the farm, to the several boats we've had, moving equipment around and a borrowed box trailer a few times but this will be the tallest and longest so, wind will be a factor.

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[Davexxxx]

1) Blue Ox Sway Pro weight distributing hitch (or similar).

2) Sherline trailer tongue weight scale (or similar).

3) A visit to a CAT Scale (or similar) with your trailer fully loaded and ready to go on a trip.

You can consider those foregone conclusions.

1) The trailer dealership has a policy, that they don't let one out of their lot without a WDH if on a half tom truck.

2) I chose a different brand but already have the link bookmarked.

3) There is a cat scale not far from me and I plan to do before and afters. Especially since I plan for considerable customization to the trailer.

 

[Calson]

First step would be a rear anti-sway bar on a light duty F-150 pickup. Higher load capacity tires which will result in less sidewall flexing would be my second step.

If the truck sags with the trailer attached one should first adjust the load in the trailer and if that does not fix the problem then one should add more payload support at the rear axle. My first choice would be SuperSprings and last choice would be airbags (that can fail and need adjusting depending on the load).

My own experience with a heavy duty rear sway bar was that it did nothing for stability with a 3500 lb slide-in camper load on my 2500 class truck but it did greatly improve the ride when the bed was empty as is spread the impact from one wheel to the opposite wheel and reduced wheel hop.

 

[minirx7]

Hmm...I don't know. As I understand it, the sway control system basically activates the trailer brakes when it detects trailer sway. That's not something that I would want to turn off if I could help it, since sway is such a dangerous situation. The Equalizer sway control is friction-based, correct? I'm having a difficult time visualizing how they might be working against each other, since they work in different ways.

I've never had the sway control system activate in my F150, but I did in my Expedition (caveat: I don't know if they work 100% the same). In the Expedition system, it gave me an alert when it activated. Are you getting alerted constantly to lead you to believe that the two systems are counteracting each other?

So when i first pick up my truck in July 2021 brand new then my RV in August 2021 new, i did a lot of research and was very worried that i was going to be white knuckl driving all the time.

For the 1st thousand kms i was driving two hands on the wheel as there seemed to be some weird sway. When i stopped and teh family was taking a break, i was messing with the towing menus and saw this, so i though, hmm lets turn it off.

Night and day difference for me, i was able to just drive with one hand and even the lane keep assist started to work! Truck/RV combo in stock form (no mods) with a 31' trailer at 7000lbs was very comfortable to drive easily at 70mph.

 

[Aron]

So when i first pick up my truck in July 2021 brand new then my RV in August 2021 new, i did a lot of research and was very worried that i was going to be white knuckl driving all the time.

For the 1st thousand kms i was driving two hands on the wheel as there seemed to be some weird sway. When i stopped and teh family was taking a break, i was messing with the towing menus and saw this, so i though, hmm lets turn it off.

Night and day difference for me, i was able to just drive with one hand and even the lane keep assist started to work! Truck/RV combo in stock form (no mods) with a 31' trailer at 7000lbs was very comfortable to drive easily at 70mph.

And that's the only change between towing experiences? The weather, speed, and driving conditions were the same as well? If so, I'm going to have to try it, and see how it goes?

All the same, this doesn't intuitively make sense to me, so it's not something that I would recommend right off the bat to someone without significant towing experience. The Ford anti-sway control system, which I believe primarily utilizes your trailer brakes to counter any detected sway, should not be affected by the sway control on an equalizer hitch, which basically uses the friction of the spring bars to impede the sway movements, almost like a shock absorber. Their respective designs should work together, not working against each other. I wonder if your speed just coincidentally set up a slight resonance sway frequency where the friction sway control was working slightly out of phase with the timing of the braking sway control, and therefore it was overcorrecting and causing sway in the opposite direction, which caused it to start the cycle over again?

 

[minirx7]

And that's the only change between towing experiences? The weather, speed, and driving conditions were the same as well? If so, I'm going to have to try it, and see how it goes?

All the same, this doesn't intuitively make sense to me, so it's not something that I would recommend right off the bat to someone without significant towing experience. The Ford anti-sway control system, which I believe primarily utilizes your trailer brakes to counter any detected sway, should not be affected by the sway control on an equalizer hitch, which basically uses the friction of the spring bars to impede the sway movements, almost like a shock absorber. Their respective designs should work together, not working against each other. I wonder if your speed just coincidentally set up a slight resonance sway frequency where the friction sway control was working slightly out of phase with the timing of the braking sway control, and therefore it was overcorrecting and causing sway in the opposite direction, which caused it to start the cycle over again?

Actually thats exactly what was happening. It felt like there was like over correction resulting in more steeringwheel input required to keep it straight. All same conditions.

Regardless i always drive with it off and have a very comfortable stable ride!

 

[Aron]

Actually thats exactly what was happening. It felt like there was like over correction resulting in more steeringwheel input required to keep it straight. All same conditions.

Regardless i always drive with it off and have a very comfortable stable ride!

I’ll give it a try the next time that I’m towing to see if there’s any difference for me. I did get a similar experience to what you’re describing when I tried to turn on the lane keeping assist.

 

[Polo08816]

If I'm going to limit the upgrades to the truck itself (not the hitch or the trailer), I'd probably try a combination of the following:

1. Load Range E highway all season tires (Michelin Defender LTX or Agilis CrossClimate)
2. Heavy Duty Payload Package leaf springs
3. Bilstein 6112/5160

I would consider all of those before rear sway bars.

 

[redline]

1) Blue Ox Sway Pro weight distributing hitch (or similar).

2) Sherline trailer tongue weight scale (or similar).

3) A visit to a CAT Scale (or similar) with your trailer fully loaded and ready to go on a trip.

This

 

[redline]

If I'm going to limit the upgrades to the truck itself (not the hitch or the trailer), I'd probably try a combination of the following:

1. Load Range E highway all season tires (Michelin Defender LTX or Agilis CrossClimate)
2. Heavy Duty Payload Package leaf springs
3. Bilstein 6112/5160

I would consider all of those before rear sway bars.

Then this

 

[Calson]

"porpoising", better shock damping" is not the solution. Your vehicle needs more load support at the rear wheels. The Max Tow package anticipates this by adding a second leaf spring.

Ford recommends a weight distributing hitch for the F-150 with a trailer load greater than 5,000 lbs and the WD hitch is going to influence trailer sway.

 

[Atlee]

Note i had never driven a truck nor towed anything in my life until I got this. The big lesson I learned is to make sure sway control is off on my first trip as it seemed to counteraxt the equalizer sway control.

Interesting. I have never switched off the truck's anti sway. I use a Equal-I-Zer WDH also. My last truck was the best towing truck I ever had or will ever have, but it was a HDPP truck. My current truck, a MY22 PB w/ 6.5' box has no problem with sway.

It does like to porpoise some though. I attribute that to the relative OEM shocks. I do plan on adding 4 Bilstein shocks though.

 

[12Lariat21]

I would say your best bang for the buck option is going to be stiffer tires.
I bought my 2012 used, it already had air bags installed, and when we picked up our camper it felt like I was driving on marshmallows. I forget what tires it had on it, but I went right to Discount tire and swapped them out for BF Goodrich KO2's, load range E at that size, and it made 1000% improvement in the characteristics of the truck.

Then onto my 2021, it much the same. The factory tires just made the truck feel soft, so again I went and swapped out the standard load tires for the KO2's. The 20" wheel stock size is only a load range D for the new truck, so not quite as 'hard' as the E range I had before, but it makes a huge difference.

If your still unsatisfied after that, you can start looking more changes, personally I've changed shocks, and added an airbag system (my 2012 came with them, so I kind of did this one just because I liked on my old truck so much).

 

[Discount Tire]

I would say your best bang for the buck option is going to be stiffer tires.
I bought my 2012 used, it already had air bags installed, and when we picked up our camper it felt like I was driving on marshmallows. I forget what tires it had on it, but I went right to Discount tire and swapped them out for BF Goodrich KO2's, load range E at that size, and it made 1000% improvement in the characteristics of the truck.

Then onto my 2021, it much the same. The factory tires just made the truck feel soft, so again I went and swapped out the standard load tires for the KO2's. The 20" wheel stock size is only a load range D for the new truck, so not quite as 'hard' as the E range I had before, but it makes a huge difference.

If your still unsatisfied after that, you can start looking more changes, personally I've changed shocks, and added an airbag system (my 2012 came with them, so I kind of did this one just because I liked on my old truck so much).

Thank you for your support and patronage.

Your info is spot on!

As a general rule of thumb, The higher load rated tires (Load range D and E) will deliver a much more stable ride, under load, at a higher air pressure. The truck may ride a bit rougher when you're not carrying a lot of weight, but well worth it when you do! Thanks for sharing.

 

[PrairiePete]

All the same, this doesn't intuitively make sense to me, so it's not something that I would recommend right off the bat to someone without significant towing experience. The Ford anti-sway control system, which I believe primarily utilizes your trailer brakes to counter any detected sway, should not be affected by the sway control on an equalizer hitch, which basically uses the friction of the spring bars to impede the sway movements, almost like a shock absorber. Their respective designs should work together, not working against each other. I wonder if your speed just coincidentally set up a slight resonance sway frequency where the friction sway control was working slightly out of phase with the timing of the braking sway control, and therefore it was overcorrecting and causing sway in the opposite direction, which caused it to start the cycle over again?

The manufacturer of my WDH (Eaz-lift R6 Recurve) says to disable the tow vehicle's sway control if using the hitch's anti-sway features.

I'm pretty sure the F150 is using the truck's stability control system (using the truck's brakes, not the trailer brakes) to mitigate trailer sway.

Pete

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