Tongue weight reduction wheels

[woodlandfarms]

I have no idea to what it was called, but I am working in Miami and saw this van pulling a trailer way to big for the vehicle. As I came along side, I saw there was this device off the hitch, a pair of wheels and an axle that were taking the tongue load off the trailer.

It is Miami, where anything goes, but anyone know of this? I can't assume it is all that legal. It did look safe from a driving distance, I mean it was heavily chained and the construction looked legit.

Carl

[Diamondpilot]

I have seen them before. They have been posted on this site also before.

Chris

[OKnewguy]

Here is one, I used to see one that had the wheels very close together but can not find it anymore.
Dave
Hitch Helper Tow Dolly - ACC Towing Hitch Helper Tow dolly

[California]

That is a strange device. Their photo shows the hitch ball on the dolly is more than a foot behind the dolly's axle. This would unload weight off the back of the tow vehicle, especially when braking hard.

I had expected geometry more like a fifth wheel hitch with the trailer nose weight loaded slightly ahead of the dolly's axle.

I don't remember where I read it but as I recall dollys like that aren't allowed on the road here in California, and I've never seen one on the road.

[JDgreen227]

Reading this thread reminded me of that old movie from the 50's "The Long, Long Trailer" with Lucille Ball and Desi Arnez, they were towing a 3 ton New Moon travel trailer behind a car and they used some kind of two wheeled dolly to handle the tongue weight.

[nahfwt]

That looks like it would be fun to back up.

[GLyford]

Actually, I don't think backing would be a problem...looks like it pins in the receiver to replace the ball mount, so it's basically a really long ball mount with its own wheels?

[California]

I looked in Google Images for more photos of the AC Hitch Helper. Here's one. (This is Google's picture that they copied from somewhere. Clicking through Google's link, the source website seems to be unavailable.)

I can't tell if this photo shows a flexible or rigid connection from the dolly to the tow vehicle. The dolly is not quite straight behind the tow vehicle. This one seems to have the hitch ball even farther back than the first photo.

Has anyone found more pictures of this device?

[woodlandfarms]

California is sort of the version I saw. The wheel stance was quite wide, less than a tailer axel but a lot wider than the narrow one in the other links.

[slowzuki]

There is a huge cabinet shop trailer locally that has a spring loader caster wheel on the nose to carry tongue weight. I assume it is unbraked.