2922 KD Sway Issues

[MarkoPolo]

This is a new thread to expand on what has been already posted on the "Anybody experience sway or fishtail?" thread.

Here are the conditions and problem as I am best able to ascertain:

Trailmanors are known to not have sway issues. This stems from the axle being farther back than other pop ups and travel trailers, which creates a heavier tongue weight. One scenario exception I have seen is when towing with a somewhat smaller front wheel drive vehicle, the increased tongue weight causes steering and perhaps sway issues.

I have a Ford F-150 1/2 ton pickup as a new tow vehicle. It can tow nearly 12,000 lbs and has four wheel drive and tons of available power with the Eco-boost engine. AFAIK, this has the most towing capacity of any 1/2 ton pickup. It has heavier duty suspension and basically, does not sag more than an inch when the trailer is connected.

I experienced sway violent enough on my second outing that the Ford integrated anti-sway took control of the truck, cut the speed, and used anti-lock braking with both the truck and the trailer to "thankfully" control the situation. I had passed another vehicle on a two lane road and was merging back to the right hand lane. No sharp or aggressive turning, just coming back to the right lane. No wind here and I don't think I got over 70 mph, probably less. After shaking out my drawers, I wondered what the heck had happened. I was very careful the rest of the trip (1800 miles, about 1100 of it pulling the trailer at rather high altitudes in the Colorado Rockies), but two more times, the trailer started to sway. One, there was a crosswind, the other not so much and I was able to slow down and the the trailer calmed.

After reading feedback on the other thread, I rearranged how I packed the TM. Took heavier things out of the back storage and put them in front of the wheels to better balance the load. I went on a short outing this week with the new weight distribution. Sway still occurred. Basically anytime I got above 60 mph you could feel slight side to side motion. On I 80 between Laramie and Cheyenne Wyoming the crosswinds and air pressure differential when 18 wheelers passed would induce sway. I had to stay between 55 and 60 mph for it to calm down. This was sway, not chucking. I have experienced that before with another trailer.

I mostly dry camp and am carrying about the same "stuff" as I did with my previous setup: GMC Envoy and Coleman Bayside pop up camper. The Camp Chef two burner stove is a little heavier than the Coleman and the TM's dry weight is about 985 lbs more than the Bayside. The Bayside had published tongue weight of 165 lbs, the TM is 435 lbs. The Bayside did have a "friction" type anti-sway device that attached to two small hitch balls. The Trailmanor does have a 2 1/2 inch lift kit installed.

I do think there is a weight distribution problem here. It may be that the two extra feet behind the axle upset the "anti-sway" sweet spot of other TM models. It may be that I carry too much "stuff"! I may be overloading the hitch with more than 500 lbs tongue weight. I do intend to either get to a CAT scale or get more information from Bill on using a bathroom scale to ascertain hitch (tongue) weight, because I like to understand why things happen. But at this point, all of this is purely academic, because the sway is there, regardless of the exact cause and I really can't leave out any of what I carry. It is hard for me to picture this as a purely "too much weight on the hitch ball" issue. It seems the truck would sag more or I would notice light, not well controlled steering. My best guess is the weight is too light to the front (or too heavy to the rear) and even with the potential for over 500 lbs tongue weight, there is just not enough weight on the front of the trailer. I may not be accurately picturing the physics involved here, so please correct me if this is wrong.

At any rate it seems a WDH with sway control is in my immediate future. I like the looks of the Anderson "no sway" hitch, but I am still researching this and am open to (actually asking for) suggestions.

I don't want this to sound like a negative rant about this trailer--it is anything but. I really, really like the Trailmanor. I suspect since I bought the floor show model at the Denver RV show, I may have one of the very first 2922's sold. It may be that this model should have a WDH with sway control as standard operating procedure.

I would like to know if other 2922 owners have had sway issues. I hope people chime in and we can understand if this is just peculiar to my set-up or is something of which all 2922 owners should be aware.

Mark