Towing Accessories - A Guide to What You Need
Towing requires a lot of equipment. Whether you're towing a boat or a fifth wheel, many different towing accessories are needed to make your towing endeavors safe and successful. A towing setup includes the tow vehicle, the trailer, and the various towing supplies used to connect them. Let's take a closer look at some things you'll need for towing.
Trailer Hitch
A trailer hitch is mounted underneath the rear of a vehicle and contains the “receiver,” which is where the ball mount attaches, in order to connect your trailer. The type of hitch you'll need depends on both your vehicle and what you're towing.
Class 1 and 2 hitches can be found underneath cars or CUVs and accept a smaller, 1-1/4” receiver and have capacities of 2,000 or 3,500 pounds, respectively. These are great for things like bike racks, small utility trailers, or small watercraft, like Sea-Doos and Jet Skis.
These days, most ½ ton pickups and large SUVs are outfitted with class 4 hitches with 2” receivers. Some smaller trucks and SUVs may have class 3 hitches, which can tow up to 8,000 pounds, while the class 4 hitches have capacities up to 10,000, making them more versatile. Adding a weight distribution system can increase either class upward by as much as 2,000 more pounds.
If you need to tow a large camper or a trailer with heavy equipment, such as a Bobcat loader or an excavator, then a Class 5 hitch would be best. Curt offers two types of class 5 hitches – Xtra Duty, which has 2” receivers and a capacity as high as 17,000 pounds, and Commercial Duty, which has 2.5” receivers and can be rated for as much as 20,000 pounds.
Knowing what you plan to tow or even think you may want to tow in the future will help you choose the hitch that’s right for you. Still not sure? Talk to a specialist at H&H and we’ll get you all set up with the right hitch.
Ball Mounts
The most basic ball mounts are trailer towing accessories made up of a shank and a ball platform. The shank goes into the hitch receiver tube and is held in place by a pin and the platform gives the trailer ball a solid mounting point. Several types of ball mounts are available, including straight or drop/rise configurations. These are useful for matching the ball height to the trailer when the vehicle is either higher or lower, in order to ensure safe towing.
Adjustable ball mounts are even more useful and can be found in drops/rises anywhere from 2” to 12” so even lifted trucks can safely pull shorter trailers. In all cases, the balls themselves are available in 1-7/8”, 2”, and 2-5/16” and some adjustable mounts, like the B&W Tow & Stows may have two or three-ball configurations.
Hitch Wiring
Any time you tow, you need to be sure to do it safely and follow your local and state laws, regarding marker, tail, and brake lights. To do that, you’ll need a wiring harness to connect the trailer to your vehicle’s lighting system.
The type of trailer wiring harness you need depends on your vehicle. It will allow you to draw power from the vehicle to run the various lights on the trailer, as well as trailer brakes (if equipped), and auxiliary power. Hitch wiring harnesses typically connect to your vehicle with either a simple 4-pin flat connector or a round 7-way adapter, which can handle extra signals, such as brake controllers.
Many modern harnesses are custom-made for each vehicle application, making them fairly straightforward to install. Using T-connectors, these easily go between the original harness and connector and intercept the electrical signals and send them onward to the trailer. Universal wiring sets are also available for older or more complicated installation jobs.
Brake Controllers
Towing anything from a small utility trailer to a heavy-duty one means that you’ll have a lot of extra weight behind you. That weight carries a lot of kinetic energy forward whenever you slow down or stop. While lighter trailers may mean just giving yourself some extra stopping distance, the bigger the haul, the more you’ll need to accommodate for it up front – both to save your brake components, but to keep your trailer from pushing you beyond what your truck may be able to handle – the tail’s waggin’ the dog!
Mechanical braking systems, such as “inertia brakes” are often found on trailers that you may rent from U-Haul, are set up to apply more mechanical braking force as you stop, meaning that you don’t need any additional equipment to operate them.
In most cases, though, if you have a tandem-axle trailer or camper, it will have its own electrically operated braking system. In this case, you will need a trailer brake controller system. This allows the trailer brakes to be coupled electrically to the tow vehicle.
Two types of electric trailer brake controllers are available and they both mount underneath the dash, near the driver. The first is a basic time-based controller, which applies increasing braking power, the longer you use your tow vehicle’s brakes. It is set manually, usually with a gain knob.
The other, more advanced type is inertia-based. Like the mechanical inertia brake, the electric version applies more power to the brakes, based on an internal accelerometer. The more rapid the deceleration is, the more force is applied to the brakes of your trailer or camper.
These are a lot more precise and tunable and definitely provide a more comfortable ride for the driver and passengers up front. Some even have memory settings for truck owners who tow different loads and even loaded or empty trailers. Curt now offers the Spectrum Integrated Proportional Trailer Brake Controller (part # 51170) which installs very nicely on most dashboards for a clean look and ease of use.
It should be noted that some trucks now come factory-equipped with brake controllers, so you may need nothing more than a wiring harness to connect to your trailer or camper.
Tow Bars and Baseplates
If you’ll be flat-towing a vehicle behind an RV, you’ll need a tow bar base plate for the vehicle and tow bars to connect it to the RV. These are RV towing accessories specifically for motorhomes pulling vehicles behind them. The kind you'll need depends on your vehicle. There are both vehicle-specific and universal base plates and various options as far as the tow bars. Our specialists can definitely help you pick the right setup. You will also need a wiring kit to use lights on the towed vehicle – similar to kits used for trailers.
Weight Distribution and Sway Control
One of the problems that can arise when towing a trailer is side-to-side movement, also known as “sway.” This means your trailer moves in a way that's counter to your tow vehicle – like a fish tail. This can lead to dangerous situations where you lose control of your trailer.
Another issue is improper weight balancing, which can be due to things like loading a vehicle too far forward or rearward on a trailer. Add to that a ball mount that sits too high or low compared to the trailer and you can end up with either too little or too much tongue weight. Either one can be extremely dangerous.
To mitigate these issues, you can use weight distribution hitches or antisway bars. Some packages contain both. These trailer towing supplies connect the trailer and the tow vehicle or trailer at additional points to provide more support and prevent sway.
If you feel like you need some help with your load-balancing skills or just want to be sure, Weigh-Safe offers adjustable ball mounts with built-in scales. Moving your load forward or backward on the trailer changes the tongue weight, which you’ll see on the meter, making it super-easy to get it right.
Hitch Pins and Locks
Hitch pins are small metal rods that keep trailer ball mounts or racks from coming out of the hitch’s receiver tube. These parts are for both safety, but hitch pin locks that work the same way, but also lock, adding a great level of security.
Protect your cargo and towing equipment from theft with locking hitch pins and locks. These accessories lock down your equipment to deter and stop theft. If you have a trailer, you can also get wheel locks or coupler locks to keep them from being stolen. BOLT offers an assortment of locking hitch pins, padlocks, and more, that can be permanently matched to your truck’s key!
Towing Accessories
There are a number of other towing accessories you can invest in, as well. If your vehicle doesn't already have a backup camera or a backup alarm system, H&H offers aftermarket ones that we can install for you.
These two accessories are very useful for adding confidence ensuring safe maneuvering of your trailer when your mirrors aren’t enough. Downward-facing cameras are also available, which make backing up to your trailer easy as can be to get it right the first time.
If your trailer has old, damaged, or missing safety chains, they should be replaced. These strong chains can keep your trailer from totally separating from your tow vehicle in the event that a ball mount or hitch failure or disconnection happens. Two safety chains are recommended for every towing setup and should be crossed underneath the trailer’s yoke and hooked to the loops on the hitch. Be sure that chains are not too long to where they scrape the road and spark or too short. Also, make sure that your electrical harness does not get tangled in the chains.
Trailer Accessories
In most states, trailers require lights, a correctly-rated trailer coupler, two safety chains, and trailer brakes. For example, in Alabama, trailers over 3,000 pounds require lights, whereas, lightweight trailers only require two reflectors – one on each side of the rear of the trailer. Also note that many states require license plates on trailers, so check your local laws before hauling.
Other trailer accessories to consider include ratchet straps for tying down cargo and loading ramps or liftgates to help get things in and out of your trailer like ATVs or landscaping equipment.
Find a wide variety of towing accessories for trucks, as well as many other truck parts and accessories at H&H Truck Accessories. It's easy to shop online or visit your local well-stocked H&H store to find what you need. We also provide installation for many of the products we sell.