Anyone got a good solution for seeing the damned thing line up with the hitch ball? A clever mirror or something? (I've got it down to about 3 to 4 hops out of the disco now, on average)
Backing up to trailers....
- Thread starter DeanBrown3D
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Yup, a spotter! At least my two trailers are light enough I can just pick up the tongue and move it. What bothers me most is backing up an empty boat trailer back down to the landing. Very hard to see! I've seen some aftermarket black and white video systems, but I figured they were way out of my price range to bother with.
I actually just saw a thing in a catalog todayfor just that problem -- it was basically a tennis ball on a stick for the end of your hitch and the same thing for the trailer. I guess you can see each easily and just line them up. I cannot remember the name of the catalog though.
Not only practice, but if that doesn't work, I have seen a little 'V' thing that attaches to the trailer that will assist in lining up the trailer.....
I've seen an adhesive 'bubble' that you attach to your rear window. It distorts the view to give you kind of a fish-eye view and you can see to the ground. I think it was designed for reverse parking but might be useful for trailer attaching.
Now that I think about it, I've seen the tennis ball type alignment deal myself. I think I've seen it in JCWhitney catalogs. The other thing I thought of, and it is also probably available at JCWhitney, is a pivoting receiver hitch. You slide it into the 2" receiever and get reasonably close to the trailer, then swing the hitch in place. Once it's hooked up I think you can straighten out the vehicle to the trailer and lock it in place.
At Cabelas their is thing called the Valley Magnetic Hitch Aligner. It is to magnetic balls on sticks that attach to the trailer and hitch that line up when backing up to the trailer.
www.cabelas.com
www.cabelas.com
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syoung
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Do NOT let a 7 year old work as a spotter though. "Tons of room- long way- keep coming- BAM!- OK, stop!"
Practice, as others have said.
Also couple-mate
or put a small piece of tape or some mark on the rear window in line with the hitch.
Also couple-mate
or put a small piece of tape or some mark on the rear window in line with the hitch.
use the mirrors to line up, back up and pratice, when you are where you are susposed to be, remember what it looks like in the mirrors. 
I've got a FedEx style mirror on the back of my Disco. I can look through the rear view mirror, then through the FedEx mirror, and see my bumper and hitch perfectly. It's been invaluable in tight spots off road, too
Also if you have an old floor jack lying round, just use that to hold up the trailer, it will make it easier to wheel around those couple inches to line it up over the ball. Also if you dont put it in straight it helps move it around instead of pulling it back out of the garage and doing it all over again.
When I was working at a marina and was always moving trailers around we would leave the trailer hitch slightly lower than the top of the ball so you would hit it with the hitch when backing up. If you set it right the ball will still start to slide under the hitch when you hit it and you could just get out and it would be close enough to slide on. It still took a lot of practice though.
The best thing I have used was a hitch on the front of a truck. It makes it easy to hook up and to back the trailer up, but I don't recomend this if you are going to travel any distance.
The best thing I have used was a hitch on the front of a truck. It makes it easy to hook up and to back the trailer up, but I don't recomend this if you are going to travel any distance.