Nose load is one of the things you have control over and it's needed to help the tow vehicle to maintain proper control of the trailer. The caravan industry advise you should load your trailer with as much of the load as close to the axle as possible, and only moving as little as needed forward to creat your chosen nose load. They advice to aim for a nose load of between 5 & 7% of the caravans MTPLM, however regardless of the advice you must observe any lower limit imposed by the tow car, towbar or trailer chassis manufacture.
As the driver you are responsible for the roadworthiness of your out fit, so if the nose load is not enough to maintain good control of the outfit, you must rearrange your load, or if the caravan is empty you should add ballast to produce enough nose load. When you add any load or ballast you must ensure it is secured so it won't shift when the caravan is towed.
There are places such such as the final (fastest) lane of motorways with three or more lanes, where towing is not allowed.
The paint is applied to protect the tow ball in the factory and delivery, as customers do not like to receive components that are already rusty. The paint needs to be removed to expose the bare metal of the ball, which is required for the alko tow hitch built in damping system to grip the ball properly. Its just the same as the brakes on your car, if the brake disk is contaminated the brakes won't work properly, and the same applies to the tow coupling.
In fact it is always important to geek the towball completely clean of grease and oil- a little rust will not be problem, though if your hitch is particularly noisy when you turn, it might help to lightly clean the hitch with brake cleaner and some fine wire wool or fine sand paper. but don't over do it.
In addition, the paint will rub off onto the ALKO pads inside the ALKO stabiliser on the tow hitch and the stabiliser may not work correctly.
On our new towbar I didn't clean off the paint sufficiently and the initial noise it made when manouvering was awful. A better clean up cleared the problem.
Prior to a trip I would spray the towball with brake cleaner and spray some into the stabiliser hitch then wipe the friction pads with a kitchen dish scourer.
Not at all. Its these sorts of details which may seem peculiar or unimportant until they are explained.
Hi Gerry, yes the black towball is the Alko, only the actual round ball needs to have the paint removed. It doesn't take long with a bit of emery cloth.
Thats why its best to use a bit of emery cloth, it breaks the paint glaze easier.
Thanks everyone, don,t laugh but i ordered one up and the sparks who fitted me tow bar fitted an extended neck one for me so I have got a spare to get rid off.lol one questionhas come to mind can you do a right angled turn off 90 degrees with the said caravan attached ??
Probably can do more than a 90 degree turn if you are not careful, but it puts a lot of strain on the wheels and tyres.
the reason I asked is where the caravan is stored it has 2 tight turns to exit the farm
One thing to be careful of when reversing is that in a very tight turn you can wind the van back to the car and suffer damage. If it gets too tight just pull forwards to straighten up and start again. Small slow movements are the best. 90 degrees going forwards is not a problem providing you realise the van doesn’t follow the cars path. So going left move to the right before turning etc and watch the caravan sides and end corners. Going right etc.
When you say a right angled turn (which be definition is 90 degrees) do you mean negotiating something like the corner of a building? It's not angle thats the limiting factor its the space needed to manoeuvre the car and caravan, and that is dependant on the size of caravan and the tow vehicle and the turning circle of the tow vehicle
If you have a tight manoeuvre to complete, this is where having a caravan mover can be a massive boon. For example a single axle caravan can turn 360 degrees centered on the centre of the axle.
A twin axle can't manage it as tightly, becasue of when turning a twin axle at least three of the road wheels will have a sides ways component of motion which add a lot of resistance to the turning motion. Movers usually have some form of shuffling motion to achieve tight turns but none can manage it as tightly as a single axle caravan.
When towing forward and negotiating a bend the caravan will follow the car on a smaller radius of turn. But when reversing, the trailer will tend to tighten its radius of turn and it is possible jack knife the outfit.
I suggest you consider taking one of the caravan clubs towing courses. this takes you through many of the practicalities of towing and some of the features of caravanning.
Post 67 "two tight turns to exit the farm" so I assumed he meant he would be towing the caravan on his way out of the storage.
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