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Downsides to a long trailer tongue?
On 12 Dec 2003 04:26:12 -0800, (basskisser) wrote:
(Steven Shelikoff) wrote in message
Are you actually trying to say that if I have a boat/trailer that weighs
10,000 lbs and the hitch is 10' from the axle and the hitch weight is
1lb, then I add an extension on the end of the tongue to increase the
hitch to axle distance to 15' and the hitch extension weighs a million
pounds, that I have not changed the location of the cg of the
boat/trailer in relation to the fulcrum, which is the axle?
Yep, if you are not including the hitch in the calculations, then yes.
What YOU seem to have not included, which would make YOUR analysis
fatally flawed, is the fact that the fulcrum point is NOT the CG, and
Of course not. As I said above, the fulcrum is the axle. The CG has to
be forward of the fulcrum for the hitch to weigh above 0. So now that
you understand that the fulcrum is at the axle and the CG is not at the
fulcrum, I'll ask you again:
When I said:
Bzzzzt! Wrong answer. It doesn't matter what a foot of the boat and
trailer weigh. The fact that it's wrong can be demonstrated very simply
by taking the problem to an extreme. Say in your example above that
your boat and trailer weighs 10,000 lbs and it's balanced so that the
hitch weight is only 1 lb. If you add 5' to the tongue, you are almost
gauranteed to *increase* the hitch weight unless you use some sort of
space aged material that weighs less then 1lb for the entire extension.
The boat and trailer could weight 1000 lbs/foot and you still would
significantly increase the hitch weight if the extension only weighed 1
lb/foot.
and you replied:
Uh, no...let's see if YOU want to play the game. Find in the above
where you are in HUGE error. Hint: The c.g. of the boat/trailer has
not changed in relation to the fulcrum.
Are you actually trying to say that if I have a boat/trailer that weighs
10,000 lbs and the hitch is 10' from the axle and the hitch weight is
1lb, then I add an extension on the end of the tongue to increase the
hitch to axle distance to 15' and the hitch extension weighs a million
pounds, that I have not changed the location of the cg of the
boat/trailer in relation to the fulcrum?
ADDITIONALLY, you've done NOTHING about the fact that the fulcrum is a
long ways from the CG in the Z direction.
Assume that the trailer is level. If the trailer is level, the Z
direction of the CG contributes absolutely nothing to the weight/balance
of the hitch vs. the wheels.
If you notice in the problem I gave you and Karen, I specified that the
trailer is level. So it doesn't matter where the cg is in the Z
direction.
Steve
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