Torque Wrench for WD Hitch Nylock Nuts

[dolfinwriter]

Is this the right thread for this, first of all?

I'm trying to install a weight distribution hitch to haul my trailer of stuff from east county San Diego California to Kansas. It's a 7' x 14' cargo trailer and about 6500 lbs GTW, and I didn't need much convincing of the need for a WD and sway reduction/prevention hitch.

Here's my problem: I need a torque wrench capable of 380 ft-lbs to torque two nylock nuts. NO ONE has a torque wrench that will go above 250 ft-lbs. I've tried Autozone, Pep Boys, O'reilly, Trailer supply stores, RV dealers, tire shops, Harbor Freight, pawn shops, Lowe's, Home Depot...

How does ANYONE do this? Or is everyone who uses a hitch like this blowing off the torque spec? The BALL is supposed to be torqued to 360 ft-lbs., and LOTS of places sell hitches and balls, but NO ONE has a torque wrench capable of properly torquing it, neither to rent nor to buy or loan.

How does ANYONE do this properly if you can't get this one tool needed to do it right?

What am I missing?

I would greatly appreciate any help in this area.

 

[TJ&LadyDi]

Welcome to RVF, @dolfinwriter; glad you found us. And, I think you are in the right forum.

Now, as to "380 ft-lbs" of torque, are you sure it isn't 380 inch-lbs? That would be about 32 ft-lbs. I don't know what size bolts you are torquing, but they'd better be big ones to need 380 ft-lbs! What size bolts are involved?

There's a reason you don't see many torque wrenches out there that go beyond 250 ft-lbs; not many folks need them. That's getting up unto the heavy equipment category.

TJ

 

[BGMAC]

Here is a YouTube video on how to do it without the correct torque wrench

 

[Kevin D Pem]

Welcome to RVF, @dolfinwriter; glad you found us. And, I think you are in the right forum.

Now, as to "380 ft-lbs" of torque, are you sure it isn't 380 inch-lbs? That would be about 32 ft-lbs. I don't know what size bolts you are torquing, but they'd better be big ones to need 380 ft-lbs! What size bolts are involved?

There's a reason you don't see many torque wrenches out there that go beyond 250 ft-lbs; not many folks need them. That's getting up unto the heavy equipment category.

TJ

7/8 grade 8 has a toque that high. I Don't worry about it as there is a lock washer on the nut. If the hitch could be tightened so there was no movement I would worry more. More like a pin, I just worry that the bolt is not going to come loose. If I stand on 1.5ft cheater bar I have about 380 and that is good to go for me.

 

[dolfinwriter]

Welcome to RVF, @dolfinwriter; glad you found us. And, I think you are in the right forum.

Now, as to "380 ft-lbs" of torque, are you sure it isn't 380 inch-lbs? That would be about 32 ft-lbs. I don't know what size bolts you are torquing, but they'd better be big ones to need 380 ft-lbs! What size bolts are involved?

There's a reason you don't see many torque wrenches out there that go beyond 250 ft-lbs; not many folks need them. That's getting up unto the heavy equipment category.

TJ

Nope

 

[TJ&LadyDi]

7/8 grade 8 has a toque that high. I Don't worry about it as there is a lock washer on the nut. If the hitch could be tightened so there was no movement I would worry more. More like a pin, I just worry that the bolt is not going to come loose. If I stand on 1.5ft cheater bar I have about 380 and that is good to go for me.

You are correct that a 7/8" Grade 8 bolt has torque specs that high. The chart I have shows the 3/4" Grade 8 maxing out at 313 ft/lbs. I doubt that hitch manufacturers use Grade 8s, but I guess it is possible.

I was originally thinking that the bolts being referred to were simply frame attachment bolts and would be something along the lines of 3/8. I stand corrected.

TJ

 

[dolfinwriter]

I think I found a simple solution:
https://www.amazon.com/dp/B009GLITFW/?tag=rvf01-20

 

[VTPete]

Some of us can’t leave California fast enough, eh @dolfinwriter? I also live in East County San Diego and must’ve had two or three different friends leave in the past 12 months. Sorry for the subject change. Good luck and safe travels!

 

[dolfinwriter]

Some of us can’t leave California fast enough, eh @dolfinwriter? I also live in East County San Diego and must’ve had two or three different friends leave in the past 12 months. Sorry for the subject change

Oh, you got that right. We've had enough, and it's almost certainly going to get worse. I guess they figure as long as the demand for housing outstrips the supply, then they can keep doing all the stupid things they're doing. But at some level, they HAVE to know--when they want to implement a special tax on anyone with more than $10 Million net worth (or was it $10 Million income?), and make it still a legal obligation even if they move out of state... Not sure how they believe they will legally collect it from someone who has moved to NH or Texas or Idaho.

 

[dolfinwriter]

After lining up all the bolts and checking them against the manual and kind of mock-up test fitting, they left off a 1-1/16" socket for the nylock nut on the 3/4" bolt and a 5/8" open end wrench for the square head frame bracket bolts. I could use a Crescent hammer for those, but adjustable wrench isn't listed either.

So thank you to the person on another forum who mentioned the bolt hex head size vs. bolt diameter, because that prompted me to verify everything I need.

The 3/4" bolt hex head is 1-1/8", but the nylock nuts on those bolts are 1-1/16". Those 1-1/16" nylock nuts are the ones that need to be torqued to 380 ft-lbs.

The install instructions leave a bit to be desired. Maybe they're written "correctly" for the way engineers think and talk, but most people putting this together won't be engineers. And still, the list of required tools leaves off some tools that are needed. If you assume that a 3/4" bolt means both hex head and nylock nuts are 1-1/8", then you'd be wrong.

What amazes me is the most common response I have gotten is to take it to a semi or big rig maintenance facility and bother them to borrow a proper torque wrench for this. Is that really what most people who are doctors, lawyers, cybersecurity professionals, carpenters, electricians, teachers, bankers, police officers... do? I doubt most people even know where to find one.

Probably the second most common is some version of a "calibrated elbow" approach. I don't torque spec every single thing I work on that lists a torque spec, but torque specs exist to ensure that things are properly tightened, but at the same time not OVER-tightened. This seems like something where it is really important to get it right. One of the reviews of this was a user who winged it, and down the road it came loose. He was smart enough to be checking it at intervals, so he caught it and had tools to tighten it. But would it have come loose at all if he'd gotten the torque to spec to begin with?

And RV dealers and trailer supply stores have NOTHING to do this properly. THAT blows my mind.

So I bought a 3/4" breaker bar, a 3/4" torque adapter (https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B009GLITFW/?tag=rvf01-20), and a 3/4" 6-pt impact rated socket set w/ratchet and extensions. It's costing me about as much as the proper rated torque wrench by itself, but I'll do this right and I'll have some versatile tools for future use.

 

[Kevin D Pem]

You are correct that a 7/8" Grade 8 bolt has torque specs that high. The chart I have shows the 3/4" Grade 8 maxing out at 313 ft/lbs. I doubt that hitch manufacturers use Grade 8s, but I guess it is possible.

The Reese hitch I had did use grade 8s.

 

[dolfinwriter]

Now I'm stuck. Nearly finished setup last night and ran into a frame interference problem with the frame brackets. My trailer has a steel electrical conduit tube running along the trailer frame on both sides of the trailer on the inner side of the frame rails. This prevents the frame brackets from installing correctly. It looks like I have to modify my trailer to make this work. The only way I can see to do this is cut a section of the tubing out where the brackets need to be, and reroute the wiring--possibly snake them through the frame rail.

Husky towing products tech support is absolutely no help. They say they've never seen this before!

The trailer mfr tech support is absolutely no help. THEY say they've never seen this before! Maybe I would rethink buying this trailer if I had known this two months ago.

What a PITA this whole thing has turned out to be.

I'm also really curious how the wiring is routed on other trailers from the body of the trailer to the coupler and umbilical connector.

 

[Kevin D Pem]

Try just moving the tube away from the frame with a pry bar. My haulmark cargo uses plastic conduit like that used under the hood of a car. box is brake battery. Lets see some pics of the problem.

 

[dolfinwriter]

There's a weld bead right where the bracket needs to go, so I'm going to have to grind that off to pry the tube away from the frame. This is looking down on the inner side of the frame rail:

This is looking toward the back end on the right side frame rail:

When I looked at it in daylight it looks like it won't be too hard to just grind off the weld beads holding that tube on. I'll have to cut the wires to remove them, but I want to pull the wires out first so I don't damage them.

I'm thinking the best way is to cut that tube with maybe an inch or two inches clearance on each side of the bracket. I'm thinking of using this and maybe clamp it over the tube on each end to keep water and other things out of the conduit. I need to buy some of this for a home lighting project anyway...

 

[dolfinwriter]

I decided to just grind off the one weld bead in the middle and pry the tube away from the frame so I can slip the bracket between the frame and the tube. That leaves just one weld bead at each end of the three feet long tubes. I may slip a hose clamp or something over it to make sure it doesn't pop off, and I may eventually just cut the wires and remove these tubes, and then solder splice the wires and use plastic corrugate or something like that.

 

[Kevin D Pem]

Make sure what you do does not leave a burr on the inside of tubing and the tubing is well radiused to avoid cutting the wires with vibration. I would use junction boxes on the end of the tubing and use plastic conduit from the junction box to complete the run.

 

[dolfinwriter]

The trailer and its contents are in Kansas now, and I am back in SoCal finishing packing, purging and working on my house. I'm thankful for the sway preventing hitch after driving though some beastly crosswinds in the mountains of I-8 east of San Diego, and in Arizona and New Mexico east of Flagstaff. Mine tracked straight and smooth the entire way.

Saw an 18-wheeler on its side yesterday I believe near Winslow. I wondered if it was the same one I saw earlier in the day with the rear of its trailer crabbing sideways as much as 2 feet in the crosswinds. I saw a lot of RV trailers swaying a lot as well. Some of those were 5th wheel and I haven't researched how they do sway prevention/reduction on a 5th wheel.

On the way to Kansas, I stopped for gas at a Love's, and I happened to park next to someone pulling a camper trailer using the same hitch I have. I asked him how he torqued it and he said he guessed. He had two small boys in the back seat of his tow vehicle, and he's guessing at things like this. He also had the trunnion bars upside-down, so he doesn't follow instructions well.

 

[VTPete]

The trailer and its contents are in Kansas now, and I am back in SoCal finishing packing, purging and working on my house. I'm thankful for the sway preventing hitch after driving though some beastly crosswinds in the mountains of I-8 east of San Diego, and in Arizona and New Mexico east of Flagstaff. Mine tracked straight and smooth the entire way.

Saw an 18-wheeler on its side yesterday I believe near Winslow. I wondered if it was the same one I saw earlier in the day with the rear of its trailer crabbing sideways as much as 2 feet in the crosswinds. I saw a lot of RV trailers swaying a lot as well. Some of those were 5th wheel.

On the way to Kansas, I stopped for gas at a Love's, and I happened to park next to someone pulling a camper trailer using the same hitch I have. I asked him how he torqued it and he said he guessed. He had two small boys in the back seat of his tow vehicle, and he's guessing at things like this. He also had the trunnion bars upside-down, so he doesn't follow instructions well.

Did you exit SoCal during this current storm then? It’s been blowing pretty good in the foothills and I can imagine how it was thru the passes and desert. We were scheduled to drive to Borrego Sat and cancelled, ended up at Sweetwater Resovior county CG instead. Glad you got your setup squared away. Hope you’ll keep in touch with us goobers still in CA.

 

[dolfinwriter]

Did you exit SoCal during this current storm then? It’s been blowing pretty good in the foothills and I can imagine how it was thru the passes and desert. We were scheduled to drive to Borrego Sat and cancelled, ended up at Sweetwater Resovior county CG instead. Glad you got your setup squared away. Hope you’ll keep in touch with us goobers still in CA.

I actually got out before this worst, but it was still blowing pretty good when I drove out. I drove through this storm coming back without my trailer, and watching the trailers that swayed a lot in these winds made me really glad I did go for the sway prevention hitch. We get serious winds in my home state, and when I'm using my trailer there, I will be glad for it.