RV FEATURE
In Victoria, the Caravan Industry Association
of Victoria has teamed up with the largest RV-
focused Facebook group, Everything Caravan
and Camping, to conduct free safety checks at
various caravan and camping shows, particularly
Melbourne and Bendigo Leisurefest events. They
too publish future safety days on their websites.
There are also a number of small businesses that
can bring sophisticated portable scales to you to
assess the weight of your rig against its various
ratings and limits. These services are not free
but ensuring your rig is legal and safe would be
money well spent.
WDH CONSIDERATIONS
The modern weight distribution hitch is a great
piece of equipment. By redistributing the towball
mass across the vehicle, they can improve handling
and level out the rig. But they are also dangerous
if not set-up correctly. Over-tensioning the bars
The author's WDH torsion bar after being dragged
along the Stuart Highway.
can take too much weight off the rear of the
tow vehicle, increasing the risk of swaying and
jackknifing.
You also need to be very careful when fitting them
to your rig, as I found out a couple of weeks ago.
One of our bars hadn't connected securely to the
gooseneck and, while driving along the Stuart
Highway, it fell out, dragging along the road. I was
unaware of this until I was alerted to the incident
by a truck driver following us.
We were lucky the chain didn't let go and the
only causality was the bar itself, which had a
few millimetres of metal shaved off, rendering
it useless. If the bar had completely dislodged,
it could have damaged the van or, worse, hit a
vehicle travelling behind us. If you are using a
WDH, take the time to check it is fitted securely
before driving off.
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