All Hell Broke Loose

[Big Guy with a Little Guy]

I hesitate to tell such and embarrassing story, but it might be of use to others...

Last Saturday I was hauling some sand in my HF-type trailer. There's a wind-blown sand dune near my house where I can shovel up as much as I want. The sand was wet from recent snow, and I didn't realize how heavy I was loading the trailer. The road out was bumpy, and with the heavy sand and flexing of the tongue, the tongue buckled right at the front frame of the trailer. I was able to shovel enough sand out and move some of it to the rear of the trailer to get the front end off the ground a few inches. I drove very slowly home and made it okay. It was only about a mile from my house in a rural area.

I feel foolish for making such a stupid mistake. I can replace the bent beams, but a hard lesson was learned. Those with the HF-type trailers need to be very careful about overloading the tongue capacity. My "experience" was a minor inconvenience. If such a thing happened on the highway, it could be a disaster.

[SteveH]

Sand is really heavy! It's actually like fine ground up rock.
But, what material is the HF tongue made from?

[Big Guy with a Little Guy]

The tongue is the same material as the rest of the trailer frame, only slightly thicker. I can tell you that my rebuild will be much stronger than the original.

[Eric Adams]

Sand is really heavy! It's actually like fine ground up rock.

Yep..almost like ground up quartz! Almost.

Who said this:

"They'll give you cash and thats almost as good as money!"

[Big Guy with a Little Guy]

Yogi Berra.

[Eric Adams]

Yogi Berra.

Bingo!! He had some doozeys!!!
Anyone know of a web site with them??

[Geron]

I have 2 HF's (light trailers with single tongue) I replace both tongues with 2" square tube steel and quit worrying.

I'm building on the V tongue heavy duty trailer for my tear. Haven't even though about strengthening the tongue. Guess I better give it some thought.

Geron

[Q]

I had to lengthen the tongue on my light duty HF type teardrop frame to haul my ultralight on the back of my Toyota pickup while hauling the trailer. When I did, I inserted a 2 and 1/4" chromolly tube. It's been working just fine for about 10,000 miles.

Q

[Guest]

Anyone know of a web site with them??

Try this one...
http://www.laststory.com/The%20Wit%20and%20Wisdom%20of%20Yogi%20Berra.htm
...and remember, "If you get hurt and miss work, it don't hurt to miss work."

[Dave Nathanson]

Stick out your tongue and say "ahhhh" . 2"x2" square tube is nifty & all, but don't get all wimpy with the wall thickness! Mine was 1/8" and really needed to be more. And now I'm thinking that the outer tube should extend out longer, as Guy suggested to me. I'm sort of hashing it over now. If you *never* do anything more than putt along the street with light loads, properly balanced, then maybe the 1/8" wall will do. But it only takes once to smash it up quickly. Baja washboard road will do it!!! Just ask Larry Sorensen! http://www.outbackteardrop.com/

I still like the single tongue because it's not always in the way when I need to get into the back of the Jeep, but I'm going thicker next time. 1/8" is apparently ok for the frame, but the spot where all the forces come to bear needs to be a lot stronger! Oh, and if I did have a welded "A" frame tongue, it would have been much less likely that I could have made such a trail repair and been moving again so quickly. In my case I was able to substitute part of a Hi-lift jack and was on my way in 2 hours.





More photos on this here:
http://www.roughwheelers.com/montego/TD/BajaAdventure2004/index_4.html#PICT1849.html

[Big Guy with a Little Guy]

Dave:

Your trailer and your posture are almost identical to what mine were. Tongue buckled, frame on the ground, me standing there trying to use some ancient Jedi mind trick to make it go back the was it was...

That hi-lift jack of yours made quite the temporary fix. It was temporary, wasn't it?

[Big Guy with a Little Guy]

Reconstruction has begun. I replaced the weak components with two lengths of 2.5 x 3 x .25" angle iron. I'm going to add some bracing as well. The tongue is not going to be the weakest part of my trailer. The tires will pop and the springs will sproing before the tongue gives out again.

[Arne]

Just a note on holes. Think of it like an I-beam. The major strength comes from the top and bottom.

My take is, if you have to drill holes, put them through the sides. Also, many think the thing will fail by the bottom ripping. Most failure is compression with the top buckling.

[doug hodder]

truck outfitters, typically, never drill a hole in the top or bottom flange on a frame, for the reasons that you experienced. Excellent jury rig repair however. It appears that you removed some serious material that caused your failure, about 30%. For the size of the tongue that hole was plenty big, whether in the top or the side. I hitched up my comet frame to the truck and jumped up and down on the front crossmember and noticed that it had a significant amount of flex. I boxed it with another piece of 3" channel, way tough now. I also noticed a difference in the photos from Kevin at Kuffel Creek and he appears to have done the same. Doug Hodder

[David Grason]

My comet frame is using a single 3x3 peice of square tube for the tongue. If I jump up and down on it, it doesn't budge. And I weigh in at 308lbs. So I guess that extra inch in each dimension is making a huge difference. I was actually wondering myself if this would be sufficient because I really like the idea of having a single peice of metal sticking forward and nothing more. But now, after giving it the official David's lard ass test, I feel much better about it.