Although toyhauler tongue weights can routinely reach up and over 1,500 lbs, ball trailer hitches are often neglected or ignored. These hitches are a solid looking device and you wouldn’t think much could go wrong when in fact hitch problems do occur and on a more frequent basis than you might expect. Our one-ton dually is a classic example of why you should keep a close eye on your truck’s hitch.

With less than 5,000 tow miles on the odometer, our hitch was already showing significant signs of wear and tear. The hole for the hitch pin was elongating out of shape and the entire hitch assembly was beginning to bend to one side. We tow a heavy 26-foot dual axle toyhauler and we knew replacing the hitch with another OEM product was more Band-Aid than solution. With trailer weights up and over 12,000 lbs and tongue weights of over 1,600 lbs when full of toys, fuel, water, and camping gear, we knew we had to step up to a Class V hitch.

A little Google research resulted in a phone call over to Reese Products where we inquired about the Reese Titan Class V hitch. Satisfied the Titan would meet our needs, we headed over to the nearest Reese dealer and picked up our new hitch. Constructed from a massive steel three-inch cross member, the Titan means business! We headed out to the garage, grabbed the tools necessary for the job, and got to work swapping out hitches.

The directions supplied by Reese were straight forward as was the installation of the Titan. You might want to grab a friend to help out on the install because the hitches can be hard to handle by a single person. We removed the six bolts from the OEM hitch, unplugged the trailer plug, and dropped the hitch out from under the truck. Setting the two hitches side by side, it was readily apparent the Titan was a much beefier build than the OEM hitch. Its square tube main cross member dwarfed the OEM’s smaller round tube construction. Reese supplied new larger hardware for our Titan so we had to drill a few holes slightly larger to allow for the larger bolts. Once that task was complete, we lifted the Titan in place and secured the new hitch, being careful to torque all the hardware to manufacturers’ specs. We attached the trailer plug to the Titan, gave everything a good once-over and we were ready to roll!

Some upgrades give you (1) an immediate performance advantage you can feel in the seat of your pants, while others are (2) more visually rewarding, like a nice set of wheels. The Reese Titan Class V hitch upgrade gives you an altogether different type of feeling, and probably one more important than the first two combined. That’s the peace of mind that you’ve taken the necessary steps to secure the connection device between your truck and trailer with a quality product engineered to handle the task at hand. That’s a connection that many times between truck and trailer is controlling better than ten tons of weight. The cost of that peace of mind? As the commercial says…Priceless!

-Bob Balunda

Description: Titan® Class V Receiver
Finish: Black Powder Coat
Warranty: Limited Lifetime
Standard Weight Carrying
Capacity: 1300/13,000 lbs (Tongue Weight/Gross Trailer Weight)
Capacity Using Weight Distribution: 1700/17,000 lbs (Tongue Weight/Gross Trailer Weight)