Had a dream about Pintle Hooks last night! lol!
Must be the Power Pin video I watched before going to bed and the fact that the wife likes the lunette wants it to stay on the trailer. Also watched "Exorcist" but was lucky not to dream of Linda Blair's head turning scene! " Dimmy, why you do this to me?"....
So, a pintle hook it will be but will be going with a combo that can also be used on a ball hitches.
Here are some reasons why I'm steering towards it.
Quote:
The lunette had weaken from all the movement, it had lost 1/4" of material where it is in constant contact with the pintle. A larger lunette not only eliminated the slop but subsequently quieted it down significantly too.
The pintle is so much easier to hook up & un-hook.
The pintle offers organizations such as the military and especially NATO the standardization needed to have trailers that are interchangeable between vehicles of different types and different nations.
NATO has specific regulations of couplers and has an officially recognized NATO pintle.
The pintle is really the antique of couplings from what I have been able to tell versions of it were being used before the invention of the motor vehicle. It does have some design limitations:
A non-rotational pintle offers 45' of movement before locking up, which is much better than the 15' offered by a ball coupler.
The connection between the tow vehicle and the trailer has lots of movement, resulting in that thudding noise you hear. This lack of a tight connection can lead to trailer sway.
Modern multi axis couplers offer a much tighter connection between the tow vehicle and the trailer, less noise, less chance of sway, and more responsiveness.
Movement between the tow vehicle with a new coupler is much greater, 360' around the horizontal axis, the vertical axis movement is only confined by the interference of the vehicle and trailer.
The fact it's "almost" idiot-proof, or "Private-proof" as we call it. This is coming from a 10 year Army Motor Transport Operator!
A lot of heavy equipment use pintle hitches. They are superior for off road use.
Pintel hitch's are too noisy for general off-road use and the commercial options only offer about 45° of rotation r/l and thats unsat for off-road use
There are lots of military vehicles that have pintles that are rated at 40,000lbs and rotate 360-degrees.
The Pintles are also unbelievably strong. In fact I believe they are the strongest type of trailer conection possible and allow for extreme break over angle compared to any other type of system.
Some of the newer 360 degree ball hitches. But there strength cannot be compared to a Pintle setup. Those types are very quiet though.
The Pintle simply works off road better than anything else. Ill live with what noise they make off road which really isnt that bad anyway.
The hook and the ring are forged and machined.
The noise is probably most common reason why pintles aren't used but the fact that they are overkill for most applications and more expensive are factors in the trailer manufacturers not to use them vs. a ball. |
Baby Vader
Grand Wookie Jedi
1984 Jeep CJ8 Overlander
TheKlansman
Titan
