Cobra Trailer Emergency Brake Experience

Big Brother is watching...

On 3/13/2019 10:44 AM, wrote:
Il giorno martedì 12 marzo 2019 09:36:01 UTC+1, Tango Whisky ha scritto:

You seem to confuse Europe with Germany. Speed limit in France is 130 kph, in Italy it's 120 kph. I usually set my speed control at 120.

This is incorrect.
The speed limits in France have been substantially modified in 2018.
The speed limit while towing a trailer in Italy have always been: 80 km/h on Highway, 70 km/h on other roads. In practice, the same as for heavy articulated lorries.
Italy is leading in Europe when it comes to speed cameras. Your average speed can be monitored over dozens or hundreds of kms.

Some more information regarding Italy:
. fines are doubled when towing (including points penalties on driver's license)
. +5 km/h tolerance always applies to any speed limit (or 5% whichever highest).
. fines are bearable for up to "+10 km/h measured speed" VS "limit+tolerance"

in practice, most truck drivers set their cruise controls at 84 km/h GPS (no fine), or 94 km/h (relatively small fine). If you exceed 94, you're testing your luck or don't need your driver's license for your job: in this case, you may as well drive at 124 km/h as the fines and points cuts are just the same (as for 96 km/h).

If you receive a fine from the Italian authorities, make sure you understand all that's written in our language, not only the brief and inaccurate translation. Failing to notify the name and driver's license Number brings much heavier fines and legal costs.

In distant days I remember having towed my DG600 on the highway in the Appennines' bendy road at above 150 km/h with a 1600cc 115HP car. I'm old.


Aldo Cernezzi
www.voloavela.it


--
Dan, 5J

Well... For me as a longtime Saab driver, a Fiat would never be a first
choce ;-) but I would prefer it over any Chevy or its compatriotes anytime


The bottom line is that US cars are designed for US street conditions and
US driving habits, which are very different from the European conditions
and habits. It just happens that for this reason, any mid-size car in
Europe
has no problem towing sailplane trailers - nobody here would actually
think
about which car to buy in order to trailer, even though we also may drive
fast and across mountain ranges

Bert TW

Sorry Bert I beg to differ, I am UK based and have nearly always considered

the vehicles towing capabilities before buying a car. Rear wheel drive or 4

wheel drive are always my preferred options Audi 80 Quattro was good,
Subaru Legacy Turbo better, My present car Lexus RX 350 is surprisingly
good if a bit heavy on fuel. And saab and fiat shared a chassis for a
number of years !!! Fiat Croma and Saab 9000 I did actually tow a 2 seat
metal trainer from south of England to my club in the north of Scotland
using a Croma I borrowed from a friend, did the job well enough.

I’m very pleased with the towing performance of my Mazda CX-5 twin turbo diesel, hardly notice the trailer, and get 10l/100km averaging 103 km/h.
(60 miles per hour and 24 mpg in primitive units) still perfectly stable at 160 km/h 100mph whilst towing.

On Wednesday, March 13, 2019 at 6:26:21 PM UTC-6, Charlie Quebec wrote:
I’m very pleased with the towing performance of my Mazda CX-5 twin turbo diesel, hardly notice the trailer, and get 10l/100km averaging 103 km/h.
(60 miles per hour and 24 mpg in primitive units) still perfectly stable at 160 km/h 100mph whilst towing.

(60 miles per hour and 24 mpg in primitive units)

oo-whoo-ooo-whooo ;)

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eEep67akIn4

And the winner in the Olympics Of RAS Thread Drift is Mike C.

However, I had forgotten just how funny that song was when it first came out.

On Wednesday, March 13, 2019 at 9:03:02 PM UTC-6, wrote:
And the winner in the Olympics Of RAS Thread Drift is Mike C.

However, I had forgotten just how funny that song was when it first came out.

....And the crown roars in approval and chants in unison, Mike Mike Mike Mike!!!!

On Wed, 13 Mar 2019 09:27:23 -0700, Tango Whisky wrote:

It just happens that for this reason, any
mid-size car in Europe has no problem towing sailplane trailers - nobody
here would actually think about which car to buy in order to trailer,
even though we also may drive fast and across mountain ranges.

The only thing I've ever heard on that subject in the UK was advice to
buy a Ford Focus estate (four doors plus full width rear hatch) rather a
saloon was because the estate has stiffer rear suspension, so is more
stable when towing. That it also lets me cart more stuff around is a
bonus.


--
Martin | martin at
Gregorie | gregorie dot org

Tango Whisky wrote on 3/12/2019 1:35 AM:
Le mardi 12 mars 2019 05:14:15 UTC+1, Tom BravoMike a écrit*:

Yes, European cars tend to be smaller and lighter than US cars, but in contrary to the US we have engineers building them so that they drive well. The drivetrain is adapted to European conditions and drivers, and the cars are much more stable (people liking to drive fast on narrow and curvy roads) than any of the US cars I rent while on the wrong side of the pond.


The cars you are likely to rent in the US are not the ones used to tow glider
trailers, as they are typically noted rated for trailers over 1500 pounds. For
example, my Camry is rated for a maximum 1000 pounds trailer weight.

My understanding of trailer dynamics is the "stability" (pleasant handling when
driven without a trailer) you are speaking about is nearly irrelevant to
trailering stability. What I do think is important is the distance of the ball to
the rear axle, and my impression is that distance is generally less on European
cars than US cars in general.

--
Eric Greenwell - Washington State, USA (change ".netto" to ".us" to email me)
- "A Guide to Self-Launching Sailplane Operation"
https://sites.google.com/site/motorg...ad-the-guide-1
- "Transponders in Sailplanes - Dec 2014a" also ADS-B, PCAS, Flarm

http://soaringsafety.org/prevention/...anes-2014A.pdf

I think Mike was responding to the "primitive units" comment.Â* I'll just
leave it there...

On 3/13/2019 9:02 PM, wrote:
And the winner in the Olympics Of RAS Thread Drift is Mike C.

However, I had forgotten just how funny that song was when it first came out.

--
Dan, 5J

"...how many of you have had a trailer break away from
the tow vehicle and what was the cause?"

My wife has thrown sailplane trailers 3 times (thrown as in had them completely separate from the vehicle while in motion).

As I recall the first of her efforts was on the I-10 somewhere between Quartzite and Phoenix. The vehicle was an 18-passenger Ford van with the interior modified into a family camper of sorts. It had a step bumper to which the trailer ball was mounted. Unfortunately, the chains were also clipped to the bumper. The bumper was rated for a 5000 lb. trailer. I think a lot of our problems with sailplane trailers relate to their length and the resulting very high rotational moment of inertia about their axel. The loads on the hitch as the vehicle’s back wheels fall into a dip or go over a bump at high speed must be astronomical. At the very least, they exceeded the expectations of this particular bumper manufacturer. The bumper fell off. Responding to the resulting commotion my wife gradually applied her brakes.. The trailer caught up with the tow vehicle and the hitch, with the bumper still attached, nosed under the back of the van. The two vehicles decelerated together. There was no significant damage, except to the bumper, the mounting brackets of which showed clear evidence of fatigue. Good Samaritans helped park the trailer and bumper off to the side of the freeway, sending my wife on her way to get me. I didn’t hear about it until after I landed when she showed up without the trailer. It was a long weekend.

Her second try was after leaving the gliderport, which is on a bumpy (washboard) dirt road. Just after turning onto the pavement the trailer departed from the tow vehicle, maneuvered off to the right side of the road, probably following the crown of the road, and pulled to a stop alongside her. In this case the ball on the tow vehicle was attached to a proper heavy-duty tow bar in a square receptacle welded to heavy bars which in turn were bolted to the frame of the vehicle. The tow bar slides into the square receptacle and is held in place by a lateral pin which in turn is held in place by a safety clip… only it wasn’t. In fact, the safety clip was nowhere to be found. I had hooked up the trailer at home hours before and I’m sure I put the safety pin in properly, but I am also certain a properly installed safety clip cannot possibly fall out. So there. Anyway, the safety chains were attached to rings on each sides of the tow bar so they departed with the tow bar. One of the other crews leaving the airport that morning stopped to help my wife hook the rig back together. They had a spare safety clip in their vehicle. Again, I didn’t hear about it until after I landed.

My wife’s third attempt was by far her best. She’s driving a Suburban at 60 mph in the right lane of a busy four-lane undivided highway between Joshua Tree and Twentynine Palms. In this case the cause of the separation was, as Charlie so aptly put it, “a worn imperial ball in a metric hitch�. I like that wording. It almost seems to absolve me of any responsibility for the subsequent events, despite the fact that I’m a mechanical engineer and the hitch had been banging up and down on the ball for years. The safety chains had fairly beefy cast iron hooks, such as are often found on safety chains. Those don’t work. They aren’t able to withstand a sudden, forceful jerk. The trailer turned to the left, probably driven off by the last of the two hooks to break, threaded it way across the other 3 lanes of traffic and wandered out into the desert. This time I did hear about it. I turned around and came back to land at a nearby airport.