Traction with a heavy load?

Just curious if its my tires or a normal thing with DCSB Tacoma's. Had my atv in the bed of the truck while it was raining and noticed at 45-50mph on the hwy the front of the truck hydroplaned multiple times. Under the same weather conditions I can drive normal speeds without a worry, but it seemed the 500lb atv was able to unbalance the truck enough that the front wheels where not able to get traction multiple times. The tires are the BFgoodrich rugged trail t/a tire p265/70r16 but they still have plenty of tread. Just seemed like a heavy load in the back put too much weight behind the rear axle. Is there anything to correct this?

 

maybe more PSI in the tires when it rains, and when u have a heavy load.

 

did the atv leave you nose high? The weight of the atv in the back causes the front to lift off meaning less weight over the front tires. Air bags may help level out the load, thus transferring the weight back to the front.

 

The truck sat almost perfectly level with the atv in the back. Couldn't really tell if the rear went down or the front came up though. This is my first truck thats not a fullsize so I'm not used to the front coming up with something in the bed if thats whats happening. I do have a plate bumper on it so seems like that would add another 100 pounds or so to the front.

 

rugged fails <--- there is your problem.

 

If it sat almost level it might have been a combo of stock tires and the weight. As for a fix, tires may be the next best thing. I have sat pretty nose high before, and the control of the truck wasn't jeopardized in the ways your mentioning. This is with newer tires though.

 

Are you saying that you had 500lbs so far back that it was lifting the front of the truck and causing it to hydroplane?
Is this some kind of a setup for a punch-line? Will you spin this tale and then suddenly give information like 'I run these tires at 150% of rated pressure' or show a picture of a road covered with maple syrup?
It is a very simple situation. The more weight that a vehicle has, the more friction that is created for a given surface.
Add lots of water and a velocity that does not let the water clear the tread fast enough, and viola!, hydroplaning.
You would have to have the center of mass for the ATV behind the rear axle in order to create a torsional moment. Bounce the truck up and down and you increase the moment of inertia during the downward cycling when the springs are compressing.
Considering there is roughly 1000lbs per corner, and that the front wheels are 7 to 8 feet in front of the rear axle, 500lbs would have to be pretty far back.
That just leaves tires and suspension. Completely dead springs and struts with over pressurized tires is a good recipe for hydroplaning.

 

Always drive slower with a load-less control-NORMAL

 

Was waiting till these wore out but may be getting new tires sooner

I had the atv as far forward as it would go in the bed so a majority of the weight was either center of maybe a little behind since the bed is short. Tires are aired up to the Toyota recommendations. The suspension has right at 50k miles on the oem equipment.

45-50 is about as slow as I can safely go in my area when the hwys typically run 75-80

 

Wasn't implying that the front wheels were lifting off the ground, was just saying that a sagging rear end does leave the front of the vehicle nose high, thus giving less weight on the front tires than with no load. This could possibly leave the front end to have decreased control.

but since the op said he sat level, guess it just comes back to tires

 

Towing a trailer in the rain. These tires showed their colors. Also have seen them on the trail.

On the list to go bye bye and they're 1300 miles old.

 

Love this reply! Any further reply to this well be something like, "Yeah, but it was Thursday." Or something else that is totally irrelevant. This relpy should be enough. But let's see what happens?