I found myself this sunday relaxing in hot springs at the tail end of a few days camping-life is good. Around 4ish I called it and head home.-after say 10 miles I pass through a little town (fortunatly speed limit was 45mph). I get through town hit a bump and all hell broke loose. The trailer toungue fell-I thought "#$%^" the toungue busted. I hurridly pulled over (while seeing the trailer rearend the truck a bit) with the trailer swaying side to side. I managed to get it off the side of the road safely-somehow. My heart skipped a beat here somewhere too. I go to inspect the damage, thinking that maybe I busted a weld while getting to the previous nights camp spot but as it turns out no ball on the reciever. I picked up the toungue and put the jack down and there is the ball in the reciever -no nut. As it is late I quickly lock up and run into twon to the general store with only generally touristy items. I ask but no ball in town- out the door lickity split. The next town was 30 miles away but I knew it had a Walmart and parts store. I tried the part store the guy saved my bacon and even put the ball on the reciever for me(need to drop a six pack by on my way through next time). I made it back to the trailer put it on and reassessed the damage. The wiring harness had a little road rash- the Rt and Lt turn signals and brake worked. There were no running lights and no damage to that wire or the ground, figured I'd be Ok if I made it home before dark. There was a big dent in the front aluminum and the molding is screwed up, but they weren't structural items. I did note a dent in one of the triangle members. I climbed under and inspected all the welds and tubing jumped on it and did my best side to side movement. I couldn't find any issues. I then reinspected the reciever- I think there is a bit of damage from the ball draging on the ground, it feels a hair loose. I yanked up and down several times and it felt secure. I decide that its minor and am finally able to make a long (3.5hrs), rainy, and nerve rattling trip home. Every bump I hit (150 miles over a pass and through a wicked canyon) I thought I was going to lose it.
Lots of lessons learned, and here are my fixes. Do you think this will be adequate to be safer and keep it from happening again? Am I missing anything?
1. Replace the reciever-not sure about damage, but it'll make me feel better.
2. Chains-I had an I-bolt underneath (check the pics) but based on it was almost ripped in off and ground down, I plan on attaching them to the sides this time, with high grade bolts. I can also get proper crossed chains this way.
3. Weld the nut on the ball and the reciever to itself. Its not that I didn't notice something off or just was otherwise irresposible. I have a hitch that drops down and rattles. I checked it before I left(5miles before town)-shoving the trailer around a bit and didn't notice anything unsual. I assumed the noise was hitch related. So I plan to weld it and stop the rattle.
4. Make and attach a skid plate underneath the tongue maybe 3 inches high 6 inches long. If it does happen again this will let it slide, and keep the reciever from being damaged.
5. Find the reason the running lights don't work?? its not the wiring harnes. I think there is another short somewhere, likely behind a light touching the aluminum.
6. Repair the damaged aluminum with a little cosmetics. A 1ft high Aluuminum diamond plate across the front should do the trick.
Good Luck and be safe everyone! Check those Nuts!
Thanks for listening.
I also torque them properly when I do them. Unless you are quite fit, when you tighten them, you likely can pull as hard as you like on an 18" wrench and not over tighten them. I get out the 24" breaker bar from the 3/4" socket set to tighten the nut. I've never had one come loose, and even when I've tried taking one off it didn't want to come off. I ended up putting the receiver in sideways, and a pipe on the breaker bar. It took bouncing on the end of a 5' pipe with all my weight to get it to rotate, but not loosen. Yeah, I have multiple receivers for different ball sizes.
Mark (& Cindi) 
), then you have applied 150 ft-lbs of torque (18 inches/12 in/ft x 100 lbs = 150 ft-lbs). It may be a crude method, but it is better than guessing. Over torquing can be as bad or worse than under torquing. Note that I have used 150 ft-lbs as an arbitrary number; you should look up or find out what the actual recommended dry torque is for your specific application.