Thoughts on adjustable drop hitch—

corneileous said:

Nice, thank you. So what exactly is the measurement from the ground to the bottom of your boat trailer’s coupler when you have your boat hitched to your truck in the position you have your hitch set at?

If you’ve got an inch of lift in the rear and you’re still pulling that boat with only a 4” drop hitch that ain’t even in the lowest hole for the full four inches, you’re kinda doing a pretty good job of convincing me that I probably don’t even need anything more than that much drop and that if I ever did, that 5” drop B&W tow and stow would be plenty.

Is that all you tow with that halfton, or do you(or have you) ever needed the full four inch drop or even more?


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Even when I pulled a little wave runner trailer I never dropped it the full amount.

I don’t have that measurement, and it’s going to be a week before I hook back up to the boat. With the boat I get about a inch, maybe a inch a half of squat. Do I need the 4”.. Nope 2” would of probably served me fine, but having the ability to go 4” in either way “ Up Or down” was why I went with the 4”. remember that ball set up and coupler was on my 3/4 ton with a 8” drop/rise in on a class 5 shank “ 2.5inch” since I kept my hitch I only had to spring for class 4 “ 2 inch “ shank. So I was out like 60$, well worth it to me. Don’t quote me on the classes and size”s, I could be wrong, but I know my 3/4 ton took a 2.5” and my 1/2 ton takes a 2”. I still have my 3/4 ton 8” drop in the garage, wife thinks I should sell it.... little does she know I’m keeping it for the next HD truck lolol

corneileous said:

Wow, it’s still that shiny after 2 years?? Nice. Are you just using your boat in fresh water? I was told that for salt water that the black powder coated would be better for corrosion resistance.

But is your boat all that gets used with this hitch?

Also, I was told this hitch was noisy due to all the points of movement this hitch has- is yours noisy?


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I’m a clean freak. Wash vehicle 1-2 times a week and hand dry everything. Even hitch. Only fresh water but it ever goes into water only Trailer. Doesn’t make any noises or rattles. Snug fit. I had another brand that did, but love this BW. Can’t go wrong here.


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I pay the $13 to have truck and trailer weighed at the local CAT scale and would do so even with the drop hitch with a built-in load gauge.

Some of the Class IV drop hitches come with a 2" ball that is rated for only 7500 lbs instead of 10,000 lbs and I would want the higher rated one.

The rotating balls are handy if you actually tow multiple trailers with a single drop hitch. In my experience I needed a different amount of drop with my trailers and find it easier to grab the one with amount of drop and size of ball and slide it into the hitch receiver to use for a trailer.

TexasDrone said:

I’m a clean freak. Wash vehicle 1-2 times a week and hand dry everything. Even hitch. Only fresh water but it ever goes into water only Trailer. Doesn’t make any noises or rattles. Snug fit. I had another brand that did, but love this BW. Can’t go wrong here.


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That’s good. I’m still checking out that same exact hitch. I’m not too terribly worried about keeping it secure and quiet because I’ve got a couple ideas up my sleeve for that specific hitch that’ll work perfectly. I won’t be able to control the rattle if there is any where the ball is, or where the ball mount slides on the shank rail but I think one of these anti-rattle hitch pins, coupled with one of these hitch clamps but with one of these security bolts instead of the regular 9/16 head bolt.

If I got that one, I’d be happy with just the 5 inch drop but I’m just not so sure if I would want to leave the receiver hitch inside my receiver tube all the time.


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Elkman said:

I pay the $13 to have truck and trailer weighed at the local CAT scale and would do so even with the drop hitch with a built-in load gauge.

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Well you would have to. That gauge on that particular WS hitch is nice but in order to use it properly to know what to set your tongue weight at, you have to know what the gross weight of your trailer is. Does no good if the hitch scale says you have 500 pounds of tongue weight but you don’t know your trailer weighs 6, or 7,000 pounds for example.

Some of the Class IV drop hitches come with a 2" ball that is rated for only 7500 lbs instead of 10,000 lbs and I would want the higher rated one.

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Actually from what I’ve seen in the 2” receivers is that all the 2-5/16 ball part of it is 10,000 pound capacity with some of the other steel hitches being 12k, or 12-5k for the larger ball but most are 10k. As far as the 2 inch ball, some are at 7500 pounds and some are at 8000 pounds.

The rotating balls are handy if you actually tow multiple trailers with a single drop hitch. In my experience I needed a different amount of drop with my trailers and find it easier to grab the one with amount of drop and size of ball and slide it into the hitch receiver to use for a trailer.

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Yeah, that’s why I’m looking at an adjustable drop hitch because even though I only have just one trailer, I don’t know what I’m going to have in the future and I just wanted one adjustable drop hitch that will cover pretty much anything I would ever tow behind that truck. I really don’t see anything else other than my utility trailer that would require anymore than 5 inches of drop.




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I saw this hitch on a tv show the other day and thought they were pretty cool. It has quite a bit of adjust-ability but they are definitely not cheap. They are rated to 12,000lbs. Rhino hitch is the name.

corneileous said:

Yeah, I could see that. I read that not only can they not steal the slider on the B&W, but they can steal the two pins that secure it in place.

If I did leave the hitch in the tube, it would only be during the summer months when corrosion(I would hope) would be at minimum and then definitely removed for the winter.

The only thing I would worry about with either of the Weigh-Safes, is that soft aluminum. I’m sure it’s probably forged aluminum alloy but, that Smittybuilt 2” drop receiver I said I had in my opening post, was that same forged solid aluminum alloy, and it took some pretty good wear on the bottom of the shaft and in various other places. And that was just from dragging my little utility trailer a little over an hour away empty, loaded it down with house-moving stuff from the old house on a 20-mile trip to the new house, back to the old house, and then back on that little over an hour trip home to complete the day.

I dunno, maybe that Smittybuilt hitch isn’t as good of a hitch that I thought it would be but I just wondered about that since the Weigh-Safe’s are made out of the same material.

But yeah, either way, I don’t have to leave the hitch in the tube. As long as it comes apart pretty easy, I have a couple of containers I keep in the bed that I could store it in.


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That's exactly what I do, during the summer months when I'm constantly taking boat out to the lake, leave in on truck, then about October, I wipe it completely and put it in my RAM Carry bag my service dept gave me when I bought my 2016 truck, would find the part number, but don't see it anymore... Will send a picture later, but it's a really nice bag and fits behind the seat in the MEGA Cab..

Gr8bawana said:

I saw this hitch on a tv show the other day and thought they were pretty cool. It has quite a bit of adjust-ability but they are definitely not cheap. They are rated to 12,000lbs. Rhino hitch is the name.

View attachment 174167 View attachment 174168

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That’s an expensive hitch....


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Looks like about $1100+


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TexasDrone said:

Looks like about $1100+


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To my knowledge it’s only about $500 but still.... that’s a lot more than I care to spend on a trailer hitch. Lol. Even $300’s bad enough on the 6” drop Weigh Safe with the built-in scale just to get a drop hitch without the unused ball below the one you’re pulling with, to reduce ground-clearance issues.


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Well guys, I’m not totally sold on a hitch yet but out all of the research I’ve done, I think I’ve got it narrowed down to the Fastway FLASH[emoji769] Solid Tow Ball Mount (STBM) as a top contender.



I like how this hitch has the built-in silencer on it, and that it also has the built-in silencer on the ball mount it self. It uses one of those bigger security Allen wrenches to basically tighten the hitch inside the receiver tube so it don’t rattle, and it uses that same Allen wrench to basically bolt the ball mount to the vertical part where your drop adjustment happens. It even has a third security bolt that acts as a set screw to keep the other bolt from backing out that holds the ball mount to the slider.

I can get it with stainless steel hitch balls as well. It has 1,000 pounds of max tongue weight along with a 10,000 pound maximum gross trailer weight.

This model anyways, isn’t really designed to be like the B&W Tow-n-Stow but, I’m not so sure I want to leave a ball hitch in the receiver anyways when I’m not using it because like I said before, I don’t really tow all that much as it is so I have no problem with keeping this hitch in two separate pieces and keeping it in my storage tote in the back of the truck under the tonneau cover when I’m not using it.

What do y’all think? Just to refresh the memory of the thread, I like the B&W hitch but since that hitch is more designed to be left in the receiver tube, I don’t think I really want that one because for one, it weighs about 30 pounds and two, it’s like it’s almost designed to be left in the receiver because of how they made it to separate the ball holder off the rest of the shank. Sure it’s probably really not all that extra difficult but when you compare it to any of those other aluminum drop hitches, those do come apart a lot easier than that one and they weigh about 10 pounds less.

As far as the Weigh safe hitches, I like the one that has the scale on the side because I wouldn’t hardly have any ground clearance issues with that one, even in the full 6” drop because it’s flat on the bottom but I just don’t want to spend close to 300 bucks on a hitch that has that little scale on the side that I would probably never get any use out of anyways. Yeah, it’s nice but I’m probably not going to ever be pulling anything heavy enough to really be too worried about tongue weight because if I was, I’d probably be better off with a weight distribution hitch anyway and since in order to use it properly, you have to always know what your trailer weight is in order set up how much tongue weight you need. If I was ever that worried, that’s what Cat Scales are for.

The only close contender would be the Weigh Safe 180° hitch as it’s pretty much just like the Fastway hitch except the WS has another 500 pounds of max tongue weight(which I probably wouldn’t need anyway), but it doesn’t have the built in anti rattle system. Both the WS 180 and the Fastway would still give me roughly about 9 inches of ground clearance while using them in only the 5” drop.




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Well, now I think I’m starting to lean back towards the Weigh safe 180 hitch primarily because even though I like the anti-rattle design of that Fastway hitch above but after looking at it more, I don’t think I really like the fact that they had to remove structural aluminum up there in that corner where these hitches are known to be weak at, just to add that built in anti-rattle mechanism. I mean I don’t know, I may be worried for nothing- maybe they didn’t affect the structural integrity but it just still makes me wonder how much was material was removed in order to add that in there. I mean besides, I still plan on using one of those separate hitch silencers anyway because of my idea I had of extra security with it so that part is kind of redundant but I do like the fact that it is still the only hitch on the market to have the ball mount/holder that actually bolts to the shank for a tight, wobble-free attachment.

I’m also thinking I really only need just a 4 inch drop as well. If standard coupler height on a trailer is usually around 16 to 17 inches, then with my receiver tube being 20 inches to the top of it to the ground then well, that’s only a 3 to 4 inch drop. Personally, I really don’t think that my little utility trailer needs to ride level at all. Two January‘s ago when I pulled it down to Dallas when I was buying recliners and when I bought an entertainment center, the only hitch I had at the time was my straight, no drop Walmart special triple ball hitch. So while using that one with the front of my trailer really high off the ground, it pulled just fine; didn’t sway, didn’t do nothing.

Because the tongue dips down about an inch, it really needs 7 inches of drop to make that trailer ride perfectly level but I’m about convinced that since it pulled just fine with no drop at all, that 4 inches of drop should be perfectly fine. What do y’all think?


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Well guys, I made my decision. The Weigh Safe 180° 6” drop hitch. Thanks for all your comments, opinions, recommendations, knowledge, measurements and answering my questions.



Decided to go with the one that comes with the keyed-alike hitch pin. Was really wanting this pin through infinite rule but I guess since the only time I’m going to have this hitch in my receiver tube is when I’m using it so hopefully this one made by Weigh safe will be just fine. I’m still planning on getting a double-nutted hitch clamp tightener for number one, to help keep the hitch tight so it ain’t rattling in the tube and for two, it’ll be for another line of security that they’re going to have to take off if they’re able to snap that receiver hitch lock off.

Anyhoo, ‘preciate it fellas.


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Redheadhunter21 said:

Yep steel ones don't break
View attachment 171866

Like anything use it within it limits and there should be no problems exceed them regularly and you may find out the hard way.

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That was not a correct weld to begin with. It is not a 'full penetration' weld.
I see no evidence of joint preparation where the square tube should have been beveled 45 degrees and temporarily shimmed for a 1/16" root gap. Doing properly using the correct weld rod (if stick) E-7018 makes the element effectively become 1 piece of steel. That weld was only ever good for holding the 2 pieces in place firmly. Not acceptable for loading a trailer.

I might not know much as a retired CWB certified welding supervisor.

Pic is my drop hitch by Curt (also sold by other names) solid steel properly welded and with a sufficient gusset. S/B +/- $100

Shiva said:

View attachment 175183
That was not a correct weld to begin with. It is not a 'full penetration' weld.
I see no evidence of joint preparation where the square tube should have been beveled 45 degrees and temporarily shimmed for a 1/16" root gap. Doing properly using the correct weld rod (if stick) E-7018 makes the element effectively become 1 piece of steel. That weld was only ever good for holding the 2 pieces in place firmly. Not acceptable for loading a trailer.

I might not know much as a retired CWB certified welding supervisor.

Pic is my drop hitch by Curt (also sold by other names) solid steel properly welded and with a sufficient gusset. S/B +/- $100

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I don’t know, maybe it’s the angle of the picture taken, but it doesn’t really look like the shaft broke off the slider at the weld... it looks more like the weld is still intact on the adjustment slide and the shaft broke off just behind it.

But after being a pipeline welder’s helper for a couple years back when I worked in the oil field, I know exactly what you’re talking about after watching those guys the way they would weld two pieces of pipe together. Proper bevel, 1/16th inch gap, one or two hot passes with the skinny sticks, **** ground out each time then a couple of cap welds with the thick sticks on top and that pipe was stronger at the weld than it was everywhere else. Lol.

I looked at that bulletproof hitch which is real similar to that Curt hitch but that just looked like far too much for what I’d ever need.


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corneileous said:

I don’t know, maybe it’s the angle of the picture taken, but it doesn’t really look like the shaft broke off the slider at the weld... it looks more like the weld is still intact on the adjustment slide and the shaft broke off just behind it.

But after being a pipeline welder’s helper for a couple years back when I worked in the oil field, I know exactly what you’re talking about after watching those guys the way they would weld two pieces of pipe together. Proper bevel, 1/16th inch gap, one or two hot passes with the skinny sticks, **** ground out each time then a couple of cap welds with the thick sticks on top and that pipe was stronger at the weld than it was everywhere else. Lol.

I looked at that bulletproof hitch which is real similar to that Curt hitch but that just looked like far too much for what I’d ever need.


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Good description of your work. That is proper. Root pass would be 3/32" E-7018 followed be likely 1/8" or 5/32 or larger diameter E-6010 or 11.
But note the end of the broken off square HSS. One of the mating sides show a totally flat surface. One side has some material sheared off and still in the base weld.
That was just a simple butt joint weld.
What oilfield did you work at. Are you a member of a local by any chance?
I was with M/W LU 2309.

Shiva said:

Good description of your work. That is proper. Root pass would be 3/32" E-7018 followed be likely 1/8" or 5/32 or larger diameter E-6010 or 11.

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Oh, it wasn’t my work...lol. I was the helper, the one usually holding the angle grinder or switching back and forth with the wire wheel. lol. I did everything else but weld stuff together.

But note the end of the broken off square HSS. One of the mating sides show a totally flat surface. One side has some material sheared off and still in the base weld. That was just a simple butt joint weld.

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I’d sure like to see that in person. That’s a really popular hitch too. I’d really like to know what the guy was doing with it to bust the shank off like that. But just to confess, that picture’s not why I chose against it. Didn’t really want a steel hitch anyways, and certainly not that one because of its design of being made to be stored in the tube. Wasn’t interested in that and because of its design, I figured it was gonna make stowing it in a tote or tool box, too much of a pain.

What oilfield did you work at. Are you a member of a local by any chance?
I was with M/W LU 2309.

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Naw, this was way back in my oil field days with Flint Energy in southwestern Colorado/northeastern New Mexico. Worked with a small handful of some badass welders. One of them I’m particular made some of the prettiest stainless welds you’ve ever seen. [emoji41]



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Well, here it is folks. Corneileous’s saga to decide on a receiver hitch is now finally complete...lol.

All the way down in the full 6 inch drop my trailer rides fairly level but I think I’ll be fine bumpin’ it up a hole to the 5” position. Thanks again for everyone’s opinions info and suggestions.






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Wow! 12 pages of posts figuring out the perfect drop hitch for a trailer I could probably pull with my bicycle.

Gr8bawana said:

Wow! 12 pages of posts figuring out the perfect drop hitch for a trailer I could probably pull with my bicycle.

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And what’s wrong with that?...[emoji2369] It wasn’t totally all about that little wagon of mine, although it played a part because the tongue on it is so low. If that little thing was all I ever towed, I would’ve just bought a much cheaper aluminum 4 inch drop hitch and been done with it but since I stated that a lot of “other” types of towing situations have come up, I wanted adjustability with a single... “one size fits all” hitch that’ll tackle whatever comes up. That, and I wanted to hear opinions from what others have used/are using and how they liked them. [emoji41]


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