Teardrops n Tiny Travel Trailers

I have been considering a 50 degree A-Frame coupler for my build, but I have been unable to find one that is rated anywhere near what is appropriate for a tear-drop. The only ones I have found start at 5000lbs and up. And as I recall from handling these they are fairly heavy.

Does anyone have a source for a 2000lb 50-degree A-Frame coupler?

Thanks in advance.

Galen

Is there a reason you are worried about too high of a rating? I upgraded my HF trailer's coupler to a higher capacity one just to get a 2" coupler. I don't mind that it is a bit sturdier! The weight difference is not noticeable.

Speaking of HF, they have an A-frame coupler for $15. Yes, it is 5,000 lb rated... I'm not sure the angle, but I assumed it was 50º.

A coupler rated at 5,000 pounds will hold fine.

I am sure the 5000lbs coupler would work, but mostly I am concerned about it's weight. I would guess that a coupler made for the size and weight of a teardrop would weight less. I have held some of those A-Frame couplers and they weighed a ton.

They are heavy for a reason, this is so you have to put more beverage of choice in galley (counterweight you know)....

Dale

I had originally purchased a 50 degree A-frame coupler to replace the Harbor Freight coupler on my trailer. Turns out that my trailer tongue is not 50 degrees and the coupler would have been more trouble than it was worth to make it work. I really did not want to mount the tongue jack to one side of the A-frame so I used a piece of scrap metal to fill in between the channels that make up the tongue and mounted my jack there. It has worked out fine, though the jack in the picture has been replaced by a different type for ground clearance reasons. There was once a big move to get rid of these funky HF couplers but mine seems to actually work okay, it is very similar to what one of the horse trailers I grew up with had. I do not know if this is any help or not, but here are a couple of pics.

Another option that I was considering at one time is to have the A-frame merge just before you get to the coupler so that a standard 2 inch square coupler could be used. You might have to do, or have done, just a small bit of welding, but it won’t be expensive. I’m with you on the weight. It’s not just one thing, but the accumulation of a bunch of things that sneaks up on you. I think this would be lighter that using a 5000 lb coupler.

If I recall, the HF one is only about 12 pounds.

I just looked it up. Actually the Harbor Freight one is only 6.8 pounds, a few pounds more than the straight coupler. So no big deal. And it is ony $14.87. Seeing as how I have a Harbor Freight store about 1/2 mile from my house, I guess that will do.

Say, did you ever do this replacement of the stock HF coupler (1720 lb trailer) with the HF replacement A-frame coupler (Haul-Master - Item#66951)? I'd like to bring the coupler down a couple inches and this seems like an easy way to do it IF it just involves bolting on the new coupler....

Well,
I figured out that the A-frame coupler made by "haul-master" will NOT fit the 1720lb trailer made by "haulmaster".

Lame. Guess I'm going to do the 2x2 steel tube mod.

I use a 12K lb. 50* A-frame coupler (Lock N Roll ) on my 1200 lb tear drop. Everyone was having some issues with the lighter ones in tight situations. No one has ever had an issue with this one because you can not jack knife it to the point where it becomes a problem.

The last thing I wanted was for the hitch to fail.

Having had a failure with a lighter weight coupler that lead to this when it came off the ball (it had never been adjusted by Eye4Design).



I wanted a Bulldog hitch for the security of being able to use one of these locks, The most secure.



At 13.5lbs. not a big penalty