Folding Drawbars

[Swifty]

Anyone able to point me in the right direction for a fold away drawbar?

Tim.

[Poly]

do you mean for a trailer?

these guys do one they call a "swing tongue"

http://www.ezloader.com/

There uk distributor is:

http://www.statesidetrailers.co.uk/

NEIL

[Swifty]

Yeah thats the sort of thing, I want to find out how much the bending drawbar is, or how easily it can be made.

T.

[bogib]

You could also look at:

www.karavantrailers.com

Our Bayliners comes on them

Bogi

[jyasaki]

Hmmm. The drawbar is usually considered the part that slips into the receiver on the tow vehicle (at least here in the States.) The trailer tongue is the part you want to fold.

The ones I've seen are pretty much a simple affair; two collars that get welded onto the cut pieces, hinged together on one side, and an pin-secured 3-loop latch on the other (one side has the center loop, when lined up, a pin goes through all 3 to secure it.)

Trailers supplied with new Boston Whalers come with this as an option, I believe. I've heard of them on other boats, but not sure of the makes.

I've seen one other interesting configuration: The tongue is cut back, and a slightly smaller tube (to which the coupler is attached) is slid inside. Several holes in the inner tube allow a choice of extended tongue lengths. Advantage of this system is that you can extend the tongue to get the trailer deeper without drowning the tow vehicle, yet shorten it up while traveling to keep the handling reasonable.

Happy New Year, everyone;

jky

[Swifty]

Originally Posted by jyasaki

I've seen one other interesting configuration: The tongue is cut back, and a slightly smaller tube (to which the coupler is attached) is slid inside. Several holes in the inner tube allow a choice of extended tongue lengths. Advantage of this system is that you can extend the tongue to get the trailer deeper without drowning the tow vehicle, yet shorten it up while traveling to keep the handling reasonable.

Thanks for that, seems a neat idea, wonder how the brake linkage would cope though.

[jyasaki]

Originally Posted by Swifty

Thanks for that, seems a neat idea, wonder how the brake linkage would cope though.

Yeah, that would be a problem.

There is another configuration that would take care of it, though. Davis Manufacturing (Hayward, CA) *used* to make (don't think they do anymore) a kit that added an underslung tongue. Let's see if I can adequately describe this contraption:

You've got a trailer, with a single tube tongue (as opposed to an A-frame tongue, though I suppose you could still get the idea to work.) You fabricate essentially a second tongue, complete with coupler. Hang the second tongue under the first, such that you can slide it in and out (keeping it from sliding all the way out would be pretty critical...) Tucked in, the coupler on the extension rests behing the coupler on the trailer tongue.

So, when you're towing, you use the factory tongue and coupler (with brakes, if equipped.) When you get to your launch site, unhitch the trailer, pull forward a bit, extend the aux tongue, lock it in place, hitch that up to the vehicle, and launch away.

Don't remember the exact specs, but I seem to recall a 7 foot long section as the section, and something like 19 feet as the longest. Subtract what needs to overlap the original tongue for mounting (three feet or so, I think), and the rest is the extended length.

You can run into problems mounting this thing, though; as an example, my current trailer has a drag point near the front of the tongue (which gets used quite a bit, as I live in a area where large dips are fairly commonplace, and the drag point will often scrape the asphalt.)

Still, I suppose you could work around that, as it's better than dunking the truck...

jky