Maintaining proper tongue weight
and adjusting the load to be even is
important in preventing trailer sway.
Properly set up, your trailer will follow
your vehicle faithfully, but too much
or too little tongue weight, excess
speed or sudden braking, can start the
trailer swinging from side to side. If
your trailer does start to sway, hold the
wheel steady, gently step off the gas
and coast down. It should come back
into line. Be sensitive to even a hint of
sway. Once a trailer starts swinging,
attempts to control or correct by steering, can increase the amplitude of the
swing and result in loss of control.
Again, don’t be that person.
As long as you remember to drive
in a safe and cautious manner appropriate to hauling the increased load,
highway driving is a breeze.
Maneuvering in tight quarters or
backing up is where you need to
develop new trailer driving skills. First,
spend time with your dealer to
become familiar with your new rig and
get their advice on how to drive it.
Next, tow your brand new rig to a
big open area like a parking lot to do
a little practice. Use the painted lines
and practice making turns. Compared
to just driving your vehicle alone, as
you round a corner, it tends to pull
the trailer across on a tighter radius.
Instead, plan ahead, leaving sufficient
room and swing wide. Go slowly, use
your side mirrors and learn how much
space you need to prevent your inside
trailer tire from hitting the curb as you
go through a turn.
There’s no doubt that the toughest
thing to do when towing a trailer, is
backing up. Because your rig is "joint-ed" in the middle at the trailer hitch,
the trailer will turn opposite to the
direction of the tow vehicle when
reversing. This will fool all of your
basic instincts. So, back up slowly. I
suggest you start with your hand resting on the bottom of the steering
wheel and look behind you. If the
trailer needs to go to the left, rotate
your hand to the left. If it needs to go
to the right, rotate your hand to the
right. Stop and go forward if you
need to straighten out.
Recruit another person to help you
at the launch ramp. Hopefully, you
can find a safe place to park the rig
temporarily so you can go down in
person to inspect the launch ramp
before you try to back down. It’s not
unusual for ramps to be damaged –
missing chunks of concrete, fallen
over at an angle or have loose gravel
or slimy algae to frustrate traction.
Go back to the boat, tilt the motor
safely up and install the drain plug.
Next, keep the winch strap on the
bow eye but remove the tie downs,
covers and get out a long bow line,
to hand to your assistant.
Check that the motor is safely tilted up, and the drain plug is in.
Maneuver your rig into position backing slowly down the ramp, looking
carefully where you are going and
making small steering corrections as
needed with your hands at the bot-
tom of the wheel, steering in the
direction you want to go. Make sure
you can hear your assistant if they say
to stop or turn and back carefully
down until your trailer is submerged
about ¾ of the way up the trailer
tire for a roller trailer, a little deeper
with a bunk trailer. Set the emergency brake and put the transmission into Park.
As a rule of thumb, that should be
enough for the boat to float off. Be
careful not to drive off the underwater end of the ramp. Once the boat is
floating at the stern, walk out the
trailer tongue and undo the winch
strap from the bow eye, let the boat
float free, and pull it to the dock with
the nice long bow line.
Retrieving it is pretty much the
reverse process except that you will
need to drive the boat slowly and
gently into position, stopping the
engine while you’re still safely away
from the trailer and in enough water
that the propeller doesn’t hit bottom.
Re-attach the winch line, wind the
boat into position on the trailer and
tilt your engine up. The person driving the tow vehicle should start the
engine, step on the brakes firmly, put
the vehicle into drive, release the
emergency brake and then move
from the brakes to the gas, smoothly
and gently applying power, maintaining traction and gently driving the
boat up the ramp.
Re-attach the safety equipment,
chains and do a walkaround – you
are ready to head home from
your first-ever day towing your
new boat! ●
Ian Feld is the President of Do It
Industries in Bolton, Ontario. They
are the ShoreLand’r Trailer distributors for Ontario.
