Tongue Weight

rmcarthur

I am concerned about adding weight onto the tongue of our 2016 T@B 320 by placing a Honda 2200 generator on it. Presently, we have a bike rack with two mountain bikes, a battery, propane tank, and a spare tire on the tongue, totaling about 155 lbs.. Thoughts?

Denny16

I would not add the generator.  Carry it inside the TV or in a case inside the trailer, over or even behind the axles.  You got a lot of stuff and weight on the tongue now, and it does have its limits on what it should carry, and how much weight per a given spot on the tongue, the more distributed out the weight is, the better.
cheers

VictoriaP

Have you actually weighed the tongue with your current load using an accurate scale? What is the tongue weight limit on your tow vehicle?

While I agree with Denny it’s probably a bad idea given what you have already on there, without those two numbers, you’re not in a position to even know if you’re currently overweight, let alone whether you can safely add more.

rmcarthur

Thank you Denny and Victoria! I will certainly refer to the tongue weight that's been prescribed. I was not given an owner's manual as I bought it second-hand (long story). Now that I have access to this forum and have learned to navigate it, I can figure these kinds of things out.

DougH

@rmcarthur ; I have the Honda gen, and it adds almost exactly 50lbs to the tongue weight when I have it locked down on the front rack. That is with it full of gas. With just a lowly station wagon, I don't go over a half full freshwater tank when carrying the generator since I also have the spare up front and try and keep my tongue weight under 225lbs (but that's with some heavy batteries and gear in the back of the T@B).

But as mentioned above, you need to see what the tow vehicle and hitch says is the max tongue weight (350, 500, ???).  I use a tire jack to raise the front of the T@B, and place a rounded off dowel attached to a small plank of wood into the coupler as it rests on a cheap analog bath scale. The dowel length makes it the same height as my tow vehicle ball.  Then I lower the tire jack an extra inch or two to get a very repeatable measurement for $20.

They also make sherline scales and even hitches with built in scales, but the latter are pricey and normally go up to 1000lbs or more, so it's hard to measure whether you're at 190 versus 200lbs tongue weight with those.  Wish they made such an animal for those of us with lightweight trailers. With Bluetooth and voice synthesis built in.