Trailer sway

Disclaimer: Links on this page pointing to Amazon, eBay and other sites may include affiliate code. If you click them and make a purchase, we may earn a small commission.

oldguy2

Senior Member
Joined
Sep 8, 2018
Posts
111
Reaction score
44
Location
NH
Ram Year
2017
Engine
5.7
I bought a 2017 standard cab long bed 1500 with 5.7 used and pull a 26 ft camper. I took it on the highway for the first time and above 60 mph it sways. I have load leveling bars and a friction type sway control. I'm not new at towing but never had this problem before. Going up hill it is not as bad but going down hill it is worse. When a tractor trailer goes by it is bad. If 2 in a row go by it gets dangerous. I have tried different settings on the chains for the bars but it doesn't seem to make much difference. Any help would be great. Thanks.
 
Joined
Sep 16, 2019
Posts
47
Reaction score
20
Location
Massachusetts
Ram Year
2012
Engine
Hemi 5.7
Have you tried tightening down the sway control adjustment ? Reese includes instructions with their friction sway bars on how to properly set them. Do you only have the sway control on one side or both? Does the truck and trailer sit level at the hitch or is there sagging?

I'm pretty cautious when towing and 60mph is usually my max speed, maybe 65 if conditions are right.
 

crash68

ACME product engineer
Staff member
Administrator
Supporting Member
Joined
Mar 20, 2016
Posts
10,782
Reaction score
16,919
Ram Year
2015
Engine
3.0 EcoDiesel
Take the truck and trailer to a set of semi truck CAT scales. Weigh the truck by itself the with the trailer hooked up, you can calculate the actual tongue weight. Two things you want to see, about 12% tongue weight and the front axle weight at least what it does when the trailer is not hooked up. You'll want to do this with the truck/trailer fully loaded.
 

TC III

Senior Member
Joined
Jun 5, 2019
Posts
143
Reaction score
83
Location
Clayton, North Carolina
Ram Year
2018 Tradesman 2500
Engine
Hemi 6.4
I bought a 2017 standard cab long bed 1500 with 5.7 used and pull a 26 ft camper. I took it on the highway for the first time and above 60 mph it sways. I have load leveling bars and a friction type sway control. I'm not new at towing but never had this problem before. Going up hill it is not as bad but going down hill it is worse. When a tractor trailer goes by it is bad. If 2 in a row go by it gets dangerous. I have tried different settings on the chains for the bars but it doesn't seem to make much difference. Any help would be great. Thanks.

I had the exact same issues with my 2017 1500 5.7L towing my travel trailer. I tried several things to remedy the issue, but never got it to where I felt "safe" driving. I ended up trading it in for a 2500 6.4L and all issues are gone. I can't even tell I'm towing the camper anymore.
 

2003F350

Senior Member
Joined
Feb 23, 2013
Posts
1,254
Reaction score
1,150
Location
Michigan
Ram Year
2022
Engine
6.7 CTD
Yeah to really help we'd need more info on the trailer (tongue weight and empty weight/loaded weight).

That said, it sounds like you've got a standard weight distribution hitch with a standard separate friction sway control (my personal favorite setup, not favored by others). Messing with the chains won't help your sway issues - that's only to adjust your tongue weight and get everything level.

What you need to do is tighten your friction sway control bar more. Generally you should be able to do this with the lever, just give it a little more. That should really help your sway.

For instance, I've got my '17 PW, and I pull about a 33' camper, about 700 lbs of tongue weight, camper itself when loaded weighs only about 7000 lbs. It's an ultra-lite style camper, so aside from it being a big sail back there I really don't even notice it. But I had to learn a lesson the hard way.

See, when we picked it up I let the camper dealer set everything up, and on corners the sway control was snapping and popping like crazy. So on our first trip, I did what I always used to do on other TTs - I put the sway bar on, then bounced it up and down while I tightened the lever until it quit bouncing, then gave it about another turn.

Wooooo boy. I couldn't run 60 mph without the trailer swaying like mad. It was DANGEROUS. So...I pulled off at the next exit, and cranked that sway bar another couple turns - I mean it was getting hard to turn it, but I still had threads left so there was still more adjustment. Pulled back onto the e-way.

Night and day difference. No more sway all the way to 65 mph, and only a little bit when we got passed by a couple idiot truckers and campers (truck speed is legally 65 in my home state). So now that's how I tow - Set the cruise around 62-63, with the sway bar cranked down tight. But like I said, I'm pulling a really light, fairly long camper. Yours might be different.
 

69GWC

Power Wagon
Joined
Oct 1, 2015
Posts
5,387
Reaction score
6,952
Location
Spring hill, Kansas
Ram Year
2022 Power Wagon
Engine
6.4 Hemi, 8sp
What tires do you have ? The stock goodyears arr not doing you any favors if thats what you have. I would suggest some 10plys.

I dicked with mine for 3 years off an on everything I did made it better but it still had a uneasy feeling and felt more like the back of the truck was what was doing the wiggling.
I installed a new trackbar from Spohn and this seems to have fixed my issue.

Iam going to replace my control arms with new ones from Core and feel like this will totally fix my problems.
I dont feel like the bushings in the stock arms and track bar are good enough to hold things in place under load.

Pulled trailers for over 30yrs and never had a truck do what this one has.
 

slim chance

Senior Member
Joined
Sep 27, 2018
Posts
137
Reaction score
88
Location
lancaster, pa
Ram Year
2023
Engine
hemi 5.7 eTorque
pulled the tt shown, 2018 Passport 2520RL (30' hitch to rack and 7500 #s) below with 2 different Toyota TRDs using a Reese Dual Cam WD hitch, first with 600 # trunion bars and the 1000 # bars never had a problem with sway at any speed .... then got my wife's 2019 Ram, in signature, same hitch same tt, above 60 mpg sway started and increased with speed ... same hitch, checked by pros, no answers, weight on axles good ... then got rid of my Toyota TRD and got my 2019 Ram 1500, in signature below, had the same hitch and the same sway as wife's trk .... screwed around and could not solve the problem, so traded the tt for a 5th whl (2019 Cougar 29RDB ... 35' total length and 10,300#) and bought the 2019 Ram 2500, in signature below .... this really tows like a dream but now i have to learn to back it up
 
Top