Sway control for light caravan

Also, I see you cant reverse with these units attached. Sounds like very inconvenient??

When you speak to "caravan people", many of them can't believe that other trailer formats do not have sway problems.

Years ago I had a bloke, talk to me like I was an idiot because I did not have some sort of weight distributing hitch on a 1 tonne box trailer ,and he ranted that I needed to have at least 100Kg ball weight.

It must be understood that part of the problem is that the single axle trailer is a fundamentally unstable format .... and the taller, longer and higher the unit gets, the worse the stability problems get.
It gets even worse when weight is concentrated at the ends of the caravan ... as it is in some designes.

It also follows that the shorter and more centrally loaded the trailer is the less unstable it will be.

So someone towing a short, low brick of a trailer will probably experience none of the problems that terrify many caravan owners.

I have no problem keeping the ball weight low .... but on your trailer .hell 10% or 20Kg is not going to be a problem.

What I would strongly recommend is keeping as much of your weight as low and centrally located as possible ....... this with promote stability and as that weight ( like water tanks) changes, the behaviour of the trailer will change less.

One other reason for stability problems with caravans towed by passenger cars is ..... the passenger car squirms under the load of the caravan, because it is a passenger car and the suspension is designed to be soft and baggy and there is mostly a long distance between the hitch and the centre of the rear axle ..... squirming and a long lever..... this squirming excites the instability in the trailer.

Ya probaly wont have that problem either.

One thing I strongly recommend is shock absorbers on the trailer.

I remain gob smacked that many big expensive caravans have no shock adsorbers. so they have nothing stopping the trailer once excited from hopping from one wheel to the other,

The one thing that would realy concern me is such a light van is windage ..... you may have problems in crosswinds and with passing trucks ..... all the more reason to keep ya weight low.

OH and remember ..... in heavy transport, weight distributing hitches and anti-sway devices do not exist. ...... these devices are a patch up to correct a specific problem of a fundamentaly unstable combination.

cheers

Thanks Bantam, your explanation made a lot of sense.
Yes, the low CofG of heavy items was planned in the design. The 44 litre water tank runs 60mm from the axle, the Waeco CF-18 fridge has its mount the same on the passenger side and to balance, the toilet/shower with its acrylic walls is on the other side. There's heaps of storage space under the single beds and so far a vacant drawbar so the options of balance are many.

Windage - well a close watch on weather via google is a must. Eyelets on the peak of both exterior walls will tie the van down in windy conditions.

Electric brakes weren't in the design. Now they are, in the near future. Set up so they come on with the trikes brake light and the actual trikes brakes coming on slightly later will give me some confidence to straighten up when in a messy situation.

Thanks again.

The ''sway control'' you've posted is ideal for your situation.
You can set the tension to as tight as you need it, I use one on my Caravan and it took out the " big rig passing suck in" that you sometimes get.
As for not using it when backing up
Why didn't someone tell me that .
I never take mine off till i"m ready to disconnect and set up site.
If you set it up so it will allow a full jackknife with out bottoming out , or pulling out , no worries.

As for lift when too heavy on the back see if you can get the hitch below the axle height.

"Think about it "

The pull is down slightly on load but will lift on heavy braking so have the Van brakes set aggressively

Ron

There is a fair chance it will get blown around with that light weight combined with all of that wind catching side surface area. I would imagine the anti sway device would have to help but another just as important thing is the suspension design. Have you set it up to progressively increase roll understeer as the van leans while swaying? Cars are designed to do that to aid stability but caravans with their short stiff leaf springs or trailing arm independent suspensions all attached under a flat chassis create roll oversteeer which definitely does not help.