Is it possible to overtighten a ball hitch nut? I have a 6K ball attached to a trailer and thought (since the receiver and ball and nut are new) that I'd try to give it a couple more turns on the nut. When I did, I heard a pop, and the nut seems really easy to turn now... Sigh - I guess I need to disconnect the trailer and see what happened. Any thoughts?

 

Wow, what were you using to "give it a couple of turns"? When you replace it, go with the highest rated one you can find.

 

I was just using a small (10" or so) pipe wrench. And I know I'm strong, but I didn't think I was THAT strong. Anyway, I disconnected the trailer this morning, and disconnected the receiver. When I took the ball off the receiver I found that the lock washer was turning and actually digging into the receiver itself, shaving pieces of the receiver off. This is a 6000 lb. receiver and 6000 lb ball. I'm taking it back to the trailer place this morning and gonna see what they're going to do.

Also, the trailer weight is 5700 lbs.

 

Usually the ball is supposed to be torqued to 250 Ft/LBS. That would not be to hard to go over if you had enough leverage.

 

It would be tough to belt out 250 ft/lbs with a 10" wrench. If it is a 1" or 1 1/4" shank I usually put the gun on them until it stalls and always with anti seize. The 1" shanks appear to have no problem being done up to around 400 ft/lb - but they won't come undone if they didn't have anti seize applied to them!

 

my ball with a 1 1/4'' shank came with a tag on it that said to torque it to 450 ft lbs. that was a 2'' ball rated for 8klbs

 

Well here's some more on the story. I was using the truck to tow for the first time - I was planning on pulling a new Jeep Wrangler Rubicon from St. Louis to Toledo, OH. So, I went down to the Uhaul store and rented a car hauler. Got it home, loaded the Jeep, and then this whole saga with the hitch ball happened. I got the place I bought the hitch ball from to give me a new ball, nut, and washer, and went back home and hooked up the trailer - no problem.

Well, I then noticed that the tongue weight looked a little heavy, and wondered just how much tongue weight there was on there - went to the local Cat scale and got this information:

Truck (unloaded with my fat butt inside) = 7480 lbs.
Truck (with trailer connected) = 8260 lbs.
Trailer (axle weight) = 4980 lbs.
Combined Truck and Trailer = 13,240 lb

Ok - so I caluclated that the tongue weight was 780 lbs. (8260 minus 7480, which I realize is kinda high when not using a weight distributing hitch on the factory installed Class IV hitch, and since my previous posts about DC not actually addressing my questions about what these hitches can handle hasn't been addressed, I figured I was overloaded on the hitch.

I went back to the Uhaul store and asked them if they had any weight distributing hitches, since the tongue weight was so high. They said no, but 'people tow with these all the time'. So I asked if they were willing to pay for any damages incurred to my truck, hitch, receiver, ball, etc. And they said no. So I asked what they planned to do about it, and they told me to unload the trailer and bring it back - this is about the time it got a little heated :-)

So that's what I did - unloaded the Jeep and brought the trailer back. I know - there's probably a bunch of you out there that would say it was probably OK, but I'm a worrier, and I'm sure that if I got into an accident or something failed on the trailer, the Uhaul folks wouldn't help me out at all. So, it was probably best that I took the trailer back - and they didn't charge me anything for it.

I think the main problem with that setup is that since the Jeep has such a short wheelbase, not enough weight is sitting over the trailer axles, especially the rear one. There's only one place to strap the vehicle down, and that's right at the front of the trailer, which means the tongue's gonna be heavy. Oh well, live and learn I guess...

 

Well, there is more than one way to load the trailer. Since most of the weight of the Jeep is on the front axle, you could have loaded the Jeep on the trailer backwards to see if that would give you an acceptable loadout. This would've put more weight on the trailer axle and reduced the tongue weight, but without trying it, it's hard to say if it would have reduced the tongue weight too much.

 

That lockwasher should have a hard flat washer under it.

 

Mechanos - I thought about loading the Jeep backwards, but it has a soft top on it and I was concerned that the soft top isn't designed to withstand highway speeds traveling backwards - I hope that makes sense. If it was my Jeep I probably would've tried that, but since it wasn't....

Rattletrap1 - I aske the guys at the trailer place about installing a flat washer, and they said that the lock washer was all I needed, and they expect it to dig into the receiver a little bit... I don't know about that - I'm thinking I'm going to go back and get the largest capacity receiver and ball I can get that'll fit.

Still have the concerns about the hitch capacity itself - reference this thread = https://www.dieseltruckresource.com/...threadid=51363

Thanks for all of the input guys - I appreciate it.

 

this is the reason i love my gooseneck hitch, dont have to worry about this sort of thing

 

A split-type lockwasher needs a hard washer. Otherwise some of the tightening torque is being absorbed by the lockwasher biting into the hitch rather than creating clamping force on the threaded joint. This would be akin to torque specs for a dirty/rusty thread vs. a clean/oiled thread.

Star washers are designed to "bite".

 

Oops, pardon me.... (goes outside and takes new ball off new mount to install flat washer under it ) It seems like ***** always come with new lock washers but never with flat washers, I guess I never really gave it any thought.

 

A lock washer is designed to resist turning the threads to loosen the nut, and should not grab or cut into the nut or steel when tightening. That's the purpose of it isn't it? A flat washer between the lockwasher and the metal being fastened would allow the washer to spin with the lock washer thus allowing the nut to back off.

Anyone agree?

 

Well I would agree that if enough torque the lock ring would sink into the steel of the hitch and would therefor not spin. At the very least it'll cut into the paint which would stop it from spinning.