No do not grease your Towbar,it reduces the Ability of it,Just get some sand paper and rub it down,or get some brake fluid/white spirit directly onto it,and simply wipe away,If you grease it, and use a Stabiliser it reduces the efficiency of it,and damages the friction pads inside the tow ball area,Hope this helps and Goodluck.
just wanting to double check Craig, because I grease my towball, and have done for years, just because my grandad used to grease his back in the 80's when we used to go on holiday in his old Monza. Anyway, I thought it was just the alko type towballs you keep grease-free, but the really old ones like I have you have to grease. Please let me know if I am wrong as I'm going away next weekend!!!!
They are both right in their own ways. If you have a standard ball and a trailer or caravan with a standard hitch (Not with an intergral stabilizer) then you should grease your ball.(anything really from clean engine oil to multi purpose grease will do the job). If however you have either an AL-KO or Winterhoff Stabilizer hitch fitted to your trailer then a clean dry ball is required..
Guaranteed though, no matter how careful I am, on the day of driving to the site, either hooking up or un-hooking, at some point, I will get grease from the towball on my clean trousers!
I personally would not use engine oil as this is too thin, the oil will run off and the ball/hitch will become dry and the friction will cause them to overheat. Use a thick grease as you would on the corner steadies of the caravan,
First of all if the tow ball is rusty I would replace it anyway. Any pitting of the surface will cause wear and the diameter of the tow ball could ultimately be reduced.
If your traier has a stabiliser built into the hitch then you do not put any lubricant on the tow ball at all.
If you use a conventional hitch and in the instance of a caravan, use a leaf spring type stabiliser then you should apply lubricant to the hitch.
I have the latter type of hitch and use a product called copper ease to lubricate the hitch. Primarily this is used to prevent brake disc pads sticking or squeeling on cars. It has a very high melting point and so will not get as messy as normal grease. Also, as it comes in a handy toothpaste size tube applying it is easy too.
One tip here is to apply the lubricant to the inside of your tow ball cover. After all when it is on the ball it forms the same shape anyway, thus there is no need to get your fingers dirty smearing it over the ball.
For obvious reasons, I too wear old trousers when towing and also make a point of ensuring that the first piece of towing kit to get out of the car when we are about to uncouple is the trusty ball cover. Because sure as rain in the summer, the moment I leave the cover off then the grease will definately leap all over her ladyships best frock.
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