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Originally Posted by furnacebrook
Thanks for all the input guys,sorry to take so long responding. MikeD74T, I had a feeling you had something with that point. It just did not seem like all these big trailer manufacturers would put these lower rated couplers on if they were going to come apart on the road and I have not heard of any either. So, I got in touch with an old professional welder friend of mine who has made trailers for a living in the past. I asked him the same question posted here. He said the reason is just what you thought. The coupler and the ball and hitch will not have that amount of weight due to the trailer taking most of it. He said just for example, a 7000lbs GVW fully loaded trailer at that same weight would only have about 2000lbs on the coupler and hitch. And its a rolling weight as you mentioned. You would have to suspend the whole tuck and trailer to get the full load to bare on the coupler and hitch. It did still bugged me some though. If I put on a 7000lbs coupler I would need to upgrade to a 2 5/16" ball and a forged drop hitch because mine is only rated for 5000lbs the reciever is rated for 10000lbs as I mentioned so that was Ok. It would cost quite alot more to get it to full rating. I guess I wounder if what Skyco said about them being too cheap to put on heaver rated parts has a factor in there somewhere ? I'm going to keep it the way it is though as I don't usually carry that much weight more than to or three times a year.
Thanks again for the input, Scott
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The coupler's rating is about the towed load - NOT as you seem to have concluded, about what it can take suspended from or loaded directly onto it.
If you go through the whole trailer you will find similar mismatches in other places, e.g. the tires COULD take more or less load than the axles, typically more. You are limited by the lowest rated component - in it's role, not a fantasy role of hanging the trailer from it.