RE: [SilverStreak] Rear Hitch on trailer

["Silver Port" <silverport@xxxxxxxxxxx>]

People who 'double tow' have a death wish for themselves
and anyone in their vicinity on the road.
You cannot control normal road buffeting, let alone the
turbulence caused by a semi truck passing you.
If you have a tire blow out you are frankly on your way
to the morgue and probably will take a few surrounding
motorists with you.
There is no travel trailer manufacturer who has evaluated 
and approved their manufactured product as a 'tow vehicle'.
The frame is not designed or engineered to be utilized as a tow
platform.
>From a practical standpoint, you are extending the motor
vehicle electrical supply for lighting and electric trailer brakes
beyond their designed length just for starters.
The resulting voltage drop will blow a supply fuse, or worse,
burn up a fusible link leaving you with no lights and no brakes period.
If you run across one of these 'double tow' configurations,
let them get well out in front or behind you.


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> From: waymark1@juno.com
> Date: Wed, 28 May 2008 07:24:40 +0000
> To: sslist@tompatterson.com
> Subject: Re: [SilverStreak] Rear Hitch on trailer
> 
> A long time ago I posted a news item to the list about a man and his 
> wife who were killed from towing a straight pull travel trailer with a boat 
> and trailer hitched to its rear. This occurred in Montana near Great Falls. 
> Sway threw their combination over into the ditch, where all 3 vehicles rolled.
> Most RV 5th wheel trailers I have seen have considerable rear overhang 
> behind the trailer's rear axle. This is a lever arm for a 2d trailer to "whip" 
> the rear of the lead trailer side to side. Not as bad as if the lead trailer 
> is a straight pull but I feel it's pushing things.
> Real sway control (not friction) like Dual Cam or an Arrow is called for 
> if one insists on this practice.
> Oregon absolutely forbids 2 trailers behind light tow vehicles. The 
> Highway Patrol told me that it made no difference that such is legal in the 
> RVer's home state. That the HP would cite the driver and require one trailer 
> to be left behind to be picked up later.
> Al
> 
> Ken wrote:
> As noted....SOME states will allow a double tow but only with the first 
> hitch being a 5th wheel hitch, so a bumper pull can not pull anything behind 
> it.  I believe that Texas will allow a second trailer if the first is a 5th 
> wheel and nothing on a bumper pull.
> Just this past weekend, we saw a 26' of so bumper pull with a 16 to 18' 
> boat in tow behind it.  The travel trailer did not have any W/D on the hitch.  
> He was trucking along at close to 70 MPH.
> No one has ever said that you have to be smart to buy and RV...all you 
> need is the cash or credit and you are an RVer.
>  Ken Wilson 
> KE5DFR@sbcglobal.net 
> Cypress, Texas