Having had a bit of experience with towing I would say that altering weight to the rear to lower ballweight can be fraught with danger.
Euro vans are designed different to Aussie vans and have the heavy things like kitchens etc centred to lighten the ball weight.
Aussie vans frequently have a lot of weight toward the ends and that ups the ball weight.
It is accepted that Aussie vans should have at least 10% of GVM as ball weight.
My van was 2850Kg loaded and had a ball weight of 300kg. I wouldn't like to have towed it with a 100 kg removed
Moving weight to the rear can bring on fishtailing with catastrophic results.
I have seen what happened to a nearly new van that was incorrectly loaded and jackknifed because of the tow vehicle suddenly having to brake and the van decided to swap ends. Poor brake settings also contributed to it as well... I would not tow an Aussie spec 2000kg van with a ball weight of 100kg as it would be prone to instability.
Also the manufacturers recommended weight should not be exceeded for obvious reasons Pulling towbar bolts out of car body for instance or twisting rear of vehicle.
Also despite some thinking it does, Fitting a weight distribution hitch does NOT LIGHTEN BALL WEIGHT.
The ball weight of a trailer is weighed disconnected from the tow vehicle and that weight is always that weight. The only way to lighten it is with a Jack under it or a skyhook above it.
Last edited by Hillbilly; 19-02-2014 at 08:13 PM.
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