Is it common to break a spring bar on an WDH?

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OBXDave

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Have a new Husky Centerline WDH with spring bars (model 32218, 800-1,200#) towing a 6000# (loaded) travel trailer with my 2020 BigHorn 5.7 Hemi. Bought it off Amazon in Nov. About 500 mile into our very first trip one of the spring bars snapped right in half while pulling into a gas station at about 10 mph. Everything working perfectly fine right up until it just decided to snap (with a large bang!). Not sure how it would have reacted had it snapped while doing 65 mph on the highway, but glad I never found out.

Looking at the cross section of the broken area my feeble brain is telling me it looks like there is/was a serious casting flaw that occurred during manufacture covering about a third of the cross section (see pic) versus the clean “break” area in the cross section. Would you agree?

I contacted Husky right away (after hours) and waiting to hear back. We’re in the middle of driving from NC to middle FL. After the failure I just pulled both the broken bar and good bar off and continued to our midway camping spot. A bit more sag without the bars on but nothing crazy. Obviously not as well behaved without the friction bars in place but it managed ok doing 60 mph on I95. I would sure like to get a replacement bar on their ASAP. Thanks for any advice!AA63C953-B290-436A-8268-6535A18DC7B4.jpeg57ACE862-0785-45AF-BD0F-3CF889BAE5EA.jpeg
 
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Farmer Fran

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Holy crap! I have a eaz lift elite and have never seen anything like that!

Edit, maybe just me but i would ditch that system.
 

John Jensen

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Wow! I've been towing with WDHs for over 65 years and have never seen or heard of a bar breaking. Has to be a mfg flaw. I'm an Equal-i-zer fan
 

14hemiexpress

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I broke one on my dads blue ox I had it adjusted to tight. I also found out that he has 1500lb bars and his trailer was 1600lbs hitch weight on his trailer. But 800-1200 bars on a 6k trailer should be perfect. Same hitch I use on my 8200lb camper and it’s perfect.
 

crash68

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I'll second the manufacturing defect theory, guessing it probably wasn't tempered correctly.
 

avantiguy

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Rust says the flaw has been there for a while. Steel doesn't like a stress riser like that so the force became enough to tear the metal for a portion until the entire bar failed.

I'd say manufacturing flaw so they should cover it and supply a new one. This can happen to the best of equipment.
 

PoMansRam

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Those are pretty hefty looking bars too!

Like said above, did the rust form after the break or was it there as soon as you noticed the break?
 

runamuck

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I have that same wdh with 800# bars. been using for 3 years on my 6000# trailer..many many hookups no problem. those bars look like they had a flaw judging from the incursion of rust at the break point..seems like the bars would bend before just snapping.
 
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dhay13

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My son has the same WDH and hasn't had any issues.
 

NH RAM

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I logged about 10k miles on my Blue Ox Swaypro setup and never had issues, nor have I seen a broken spring bar before. Hopefully they take care of you very soon- if not, I'd buy a replacement and ask for reimbursement rather than towing without sway control and a wdh.
 

14hemiexpress

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Here is the one I broke, like I said mine was overloaded and to tight unknowing what my dads trailer really weighed(my fault for not researching) but yours is more than adequate I’ll be interested in hearing what the manufacture has to say.

5D9E0588-BE34-405A-88FC-75BBF522029B.jpeg
 
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OBXDave

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So it was a manufacturing flaw. The Husky rep on the phone admitted as much and said they would drop ship a replacement bar to us right away. They also wanted a pic of the bar stamp,..... I assume to investigate the rest of that particular manufacturing lot. I know of many Husky WDH’s out their with no issues so suspect this was a rare type of flaw.

In order to get to our destination the Husky service tech said it was ok to just remount the one good bar on the drivers side and continue on at a conservative 60-65mph. Finished the last 6 hours of I95 driving with one bar mounted as instructed, and had no issues at all. It actually drove surprisingly well with just one bar mounted. New bar will be here before we head home. All good. Thanks for the input :)
 
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JayLeonard

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Rust says the flaw has been there for a while. Steel doesn't like a stress riser like that so the force became enough to tear the metal for a portion until the entire bar failed.

I'd say manufacturing flaw so they should cover it and supply a new one. This can happen to the best of equipment.

Yes I agree with this assessment. The defect has been there for some time. I have done a fair bit of failure analysis in my 40 years as a manufacturing engineer. This looks "classic".
 

Doug Ram

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HOLY $#!T!

This a potentially dangerous defect which you should report to NHTSA. See "Aftermarket Equipment" at:
https://www.nhtsa.gov/report-a-safety-problem#index

Imagine if that thing had broken while you were back there hooking the trailer up.

Seriously, this is the kind of thing that totally freaks me out. I was injured by a snapped bar on a portable in-water steel boat hoist. The defective bar held the lifting cable spool above the boat (a design I never see anymore). The wire wrapped around the overhead spool to lift the boat. The hoist was rated for 5,000 lbs; the boat was about half that. When the bar broke it pinned my arm to the dashboard (after going thru the windshield frame, plexiglass windshield and steering wheel). Although my arm wasn't broken, it was well bruised. When it broke it sounded like a gunshot.
 
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