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The Tow Hitch Near-Disaster I Didn’t Know About
A few weeks ago, I wrote about my annual battle with my ancient MTD snowblower. I threw $19 at it for another replacement carburetor, and it fired up immediately. I was resigned to soldier through the rest of the winter with it when something unexpected happened.
A dear friend called me up to bounce a question off me about buying a BMW unicorn E46 rear-wheel drive stick wagon. After we were done discussing it, he asked what was new, and I said “Oh, just the usual battle with the snowblower.” He said “I have a spare Ariens you can have if you need it.” Obviously, I was interested.
The story was that after his ex-wife had passed away last year, he helped their kids deal with liquidating the contents of her house. After the estate sale ended, there were items that hadn’t sold, including the snowblower. Neither of his kids wanted it, so rather than have it be liquidated by the real estate agent, he grabbed it. “It’s on the roof of my workshop,” he said (this isn’t as odd as it sounds; his property slopes downward so the roof is on street level), “but I don’t think it’s been fired up in a few years.”
My first thought was “Great. Another dead snowblower with old gas in it.”
Still, as with cars, you never know unless you look. So I drove the 15 minutes over to his house with a gas can, starting fluid, and my road toolbox, and was surprised to find a decent-looking Ariens AX369 Platinum SHO 24 with more chute controls than my decrepit MTD, and heated grips. There was some flaking paint and rust on the auger housing from sitting outside, but it still looked pretty nice.
I know the drill. Undo the shroud around the carburetor, spray some starting fluid into the throat, press the electric start, and see what happens. The red herring of a bad extension cord delayed the launch, but eventually I got the thing spinning. As I expected, it ran for a few seconds, then died. I drained the old gas out of the float bowl, dumped fresh gas into the tank, and it woke up as if nothing had happened. Cool.
However, when I squeezed the left lever, it didn’t budge. I soon realized that both of the wheels as well as the auger housing were literally frozen in place, though I was a little surprised that I didn’t hear the “ker-CHUNK” that my MTD makes when you put it in gear. Still, warm weather was forecast for the next few days, so the problem was going to resolve itself.
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A few days later, I went back with my Armada and a crowbar just in case the ice needed some persuasion to release its grip on the Ariens. It did, but once free, the blower easily self-propelled itself onto the sidewalk. Right then. Let’s get this done. I’d already scoped out that the U-Haul dealer a few miles away had a motorcycle trailer I could rent to get the Ariens home, so I headed over there.
The U-Haul agent dragged the little motorcycle trailer to my trailer hitch and dropped it on. But when he tightened the knob on the top of the trailer tongue, the hitch ball wigged visibly. We both looked at it, surprised. When he undid the tongue and lifted it, the unthinkable happened:
The hitch ball came completely up and out of the hitch because the securing nut underneath it was completely missing.
My mind immediately raced. When was the last time I used the Armada and the hitch? In August I towed the BMW E30 (the FrankenThirty) home from Albany. I remember afterward whacking my shin on the hitch in my driveway, so I removed it and threw it in the back of the Armada. The next tow was the Lotus Elan +2 in November. The hitch had been on the back of the Armada ever since, but I hadn’t towed anything else.
So when did the nut fall off? Did I tow my precious little Elan +2 home from New Hampshire with an unsecured hitch ball?
Focus, Rob. You can do the post-mortem on this later. I told the U-Haul agent “I have another hitch at my house. I’ll be right back.” I did, I was, and I hauled home the Ariens home without incident.
But for the rest of the day, I thought about the likely mechanics of the missing nut. All medium-to-large trailers, including a U-Haul auto transporter, have enough unladen tongue weight that they have an integrated hand-cranked tongue jack to allow you to raise the tongue and then lower the tongue onto ball after you’ve backed up the vehicle so the hitch ball is under it. Only small things like motorcycle and garden trailers are light enough that they don’t have a tongue jack. So it’s quite possible that if the ball had come loose while towing the Lotus, neither I nor the previous U-Haul agent would’ve noticed when the auto transporter was unhooked because the gentle raising of the trailer with the tongue jack probably wouldn’t have disturbed the ball in the same way that manually lifting the motorcycle trailer did. I suppose it’s possible that the ball loosened up in the three months since I towed the Elan, but it’s far more likely that it happened during the jouncing and bouncing of the 70-mile vehicle tow. And while loaded auto transporters have a fair amount of tongue weight that would’ve kept the ball in place, the idea that a bounce could’ve lifted that ball out of its hole gave me shivers.
I’ve always been in the habit of, after I’ve passed papers on a car and loaded it onto the trailer, calling Hagerty to establish coverage before the tow home, but I never envisioned something like this. You can bet that from now on I am always going to double-check that the hitch ball is secure before I tow something. And leave a spare hitch in the back of the Armada.
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Rob’s latest book, The Best Of The Hack Mechanic™: 35 years of hacks, kluges, and assorted automotive mayhem, is available on Amazon here. His other seven books are available here on Amazon, or you can order personally inscribed copies from Rob’s website, www.robsiegel.com.
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If it fell off it was not installed correctly. That should be more concerning. Who did that you or someone who borrowed it? Pays to check these things before towing and knowing what to do.
I had a friend who towed a car on a trailer trunk first. They nearly crashed going down a hill as the rear trick wheels unloaded. They did not want to take the time to push the car around the right way and did not know it was dangerous.
At least they did not take anyone out with them.
Other towing mistakes. Another buddy was helping with a Sprint Car. They open trailered and it was late. So they though lets leave the wing on. Not a good thing on a V6 Chevy truck as while the car is light the wing down ford would hardly let them to 50 MPH with the struggling 4.3. Later in the year the car came loose on a hill and rolled down and over the edge. At least the bars kept it from damage when the tree stopped it. I was glad I was not part of these adventures.
My towing experience is limited to some boats and a tow truck. But I have learned much from others. Be wary of locals towing as they may not know what they do. LOL!
The nut came off sometime after towing the Elan. If the nut wasn’t on there when you were unloading the Elan, you would’ve known it when the back of the trailer dropped to the ground and the hitch went up in the air due to the car’s weight being behind the trailer’s axles. I block up the rear of the trailer in case the hitch fails when unloading heavy trucks or tractors. Fold down ramps with the built in stands solve that issue also.
I can confirm this. Because U-Haul’s social distancing rules during COVID saw the attendant attach my Auto Transport and not latch it.
I made it all the way home, and the moment I got my RX7 onto the ramps, the trailer popped off the ball and dented my tailgate.
In the end, U-Haul paid for a new tailgate. But what a frustrating day that was.
Good point! And it probably wasn’t towing while loose either, as the threads don’t look all beat up from the movement of the ball in the hitch. I think you would have felt it as well.
In fact Rob, if left the hitch was left in the receiver most of the winter, what is the likelihood that somebody was either playing a prank or being destructive? Could a cantankerous neighbor have banged their shin on it and decided to be evil by removing the nut?
Rob, I had that exact experience travelling through a construction zone in Chicago while transiting from Ontario to California with an empty 24 foot closed trailer behind our brand spanking new 35’ c-class motorhome. I had changed the hitch ball to a 2 3/16” to accommodate the larger trailer (I normally keep a 2” ball on the hitch) and had snugged it down with my huge adjustable wrench. BUT, I forgot to retorque the nut before departing!
The ball loosened over the course of 800 miles and the emergency struck while I was in the left lane of I-90 doing 60mph in a construction zone with no available shoulder. The nut let go, and since the trailer wasn’t loaded the bouncing took the ball out of the receiver and the trailer skidded along on its jack stand. Luckily it had a flat square base with upturned edges which slid reasonably well, and the chains held on. I stopped slowly and moved into construction cones, changed my underwear, and thanked my Lord that the trailer hadn’t impacted the rear of the coach!
I removed the ball from the hitch of the trailer, and while the threads were mostly destroyed, I was able to fit the nut from the 2” hitch ball on the the base of the neck tightened it to the degree possible on stripped threads. I slowly reentered traffic to get to the next exit and find an auto parts store. The jack post wasn’t even badly bent. Disaster averted by grace…
I now use 2 nuts on the hitch ball to be certain that this doesn’t happen again, and check the tightness every 500 miles or so.
For your own piece of mind Rob, drill a hole in the bottom of the hitch and run a cotter key through it, so that the nut has no way of coming off.
You may still end up with a loose ball one day, but it’ll never detach.
Excellent idea, I was thinking the same thing as the stem on Robs Hitch Ball is wide enough to drill a hole and insert a pin.
The up-forces you get going down the highway at bumps and expansion joints would have you on the safety chains pretty quickly (an experience I guarantee you would never forget) if it had fallen off during travel. But it did fall off sometime, which means you had a near miss. I’d say you were lucky, but as anyone who has read you columns over the years (or who knows you personally) can attest- it wasn’t luck, it was your good karma swinging into action.
Since starting to pull an Airstream, I have been relentlessly detailed on my pre-pull-out checklist every morning before we head underway. My only close call came from rushing to stay on pace for a long day on the road. Rushing and long days towing are to be eschewed. Too many steps and things to check to rush!
If you use a lock washer and replace the nut, tighten and torque to 235-250 lb-ft. It won’t loosen.
Well..he’s fine really. Just a little..forgetful at times. Maybe watch him a bit. Make sure the coffee maker is off, doesn’t lock himself out of the house again, you know…And promise me you won’t let him buy another damned used car!
I doubt the nut fell off while trailering the car. I sure the ball would have come off with the trailer when you jacked the trailer up to unhitch. The odds of the trailer being so perfectly positioned when raised I would think would be pretty low.
I have a two pronged approach to this, the triple ball/hook receiver for my F150 is a completely welded affair. The factory welded each ball and hook for a solid non loosening connection. The receiver for my Durango has been in place since the truck was new. It’s a 2003. This receiver is so rusted into the hitch, I removed the pin and literally backed the truck forcefully into a solid concrete block several times. It. Won’t. Budge. The ball is also got rusted threads, and when I installed it in the year of 2003, I used a 3 foot breaker bar to torque it down. Thought I was going to pull the truck sideways. It’s not going anywhere.
I haven’t seen too many hitch balls with coarse threads. I would recommend one with fine threads
After hooking up any trailer, I pull up on the 1000K ers to ensure locked and utilize the trailer jack to crank up to ensure ball is locked on the heavy ones, I also keep a pipe wrench an Xtra 1 7/8 & 2″ ball WITH lock washer and nut in my truck
I had to buy a ball at uhaul one time, I think it was like 12 dollars in Oakland California, half the price they asked at the O really
Gotta love those heated handles on the snowblower!
That deserves a simultaneous ‘wow’ and ‘yikes’. I’ve never seen that before, either.
Thanks for revealing yet another way towing a trailer can go catastrophically wrong. It just affirms the advice to at least cross-hook the tongue’s safety chains, to avoid complete separation.
I agree with Al T. When that nut is properly torqued on that fine thread, it’s as good as welded. Unless users are in the habit of switching ball sizes on a particular mount, the idea to drill-and-pin (or even safety-wire, as they do with aircraft fasteners), is probably the best precaution.
Regardless, whenever I’m confronted with how I’ve been spared from what could have easily been a tragic situation, I get that feeling someone’s watching out for me.
I have no more than a half-dozen ball mounts, so since my shins tend to find them at the end of the receiver before my eyes do, another measure would be to just remove the ball mount from the receiver, which allows closer inspection.