What happens to a truck if it tows more than its capacity?

In addition to difficulty in stopping and being dragged into the lake, exceeding your vehicle's towing capacity could also lead to swaying. This occurs when the towed load begins to move side to side, independently of the direction in which it's being towed by the coach vehicle. It's a dangerous situation, and one that can occu­r even when you're towing within your vehicle's capacity.

Even if you have a history of good luck and manage to make it from point A to point B without any catastrophes, when you exceed your towing capacity, your hubris will eventually catch up with you in the form of mechanical problems.

You place your truck's transmission in jeopardy when you exceed your vehicle's towing limit. Transmissions are designed to work hard enough to move the vehicle they power, as well as any additional weight up to the limits specified by the manufacturer. Exceeding the recommended towing capacity causes the transmission to work harder than it's meant to, which creates more heat energy. This heat breaks down the transmission fluid that lubricates the transmission's moving parts. Without proper lubrication, the transmission can seize up and cause major damage.

So how can you protect yourself from physical and mechanical problems from exceeding towing capacity?

While it might seem appropriate, upgrading to a trailer hitch won't increase your vehicle's towing capacity -- it will upgrade your trailer hitch's towing capacity. However, you can purchase a weight-distributing hitch, which will vastly increase your vehicle's ability to tow due to the weight being distributed among the coach vehicle's wheels. Vehicles have a weight distributed tow rating -- the towing weight rating -- and it shouldn't be exceeded either. You'll encounter the same problems.

One way to prevent damage to your vehicle is to install a transmission oil cooler. You can install this aftermarket product in front of your radiator to give your factory-installed cooler some extra help. In most models, transmission fluid is passed through the extra cooler before traveling along to the transmission. This extra step greatly decreases the fluid temperature and protects the transmission during towing.

The easiest method for avoiding problems is, of course, not to exceed your towing capacity. You can determine the weight of your loaded trailer (its gross trailer weight), by weighing your trailer on a scale. You should probably avoid using your bathroom scale, as it would surely be crushed under the weight. Instead, a quick Internet search will yield all sorts of public and private scale locations that will give you a precise measure of how much your trailer weighs. As long as you don't exceed your vehicle's towing capacity, you should be able to tow to your heart's content.

For more information on towing and other related topics, visit the next page.