Weight Distribution Problem

Help. I bought a hitch-mounted cargo tray to carry a big ice chest, fishing equipment, etc. Fully loaded, it's carrying a couple hundred pounds or so. This is pushing the back down and the nose up, and irritating a lot of on-coming drivers at night who think I've got the high-beams on.

How would you resolve this problem? Should I adjust the headlights (if so, how)? Is there something I can do to the rear suspension to counteract the increased weight? (I have researched the archives and didn't find anything on point.)

Depends on how often you'll be using that hitch rack.

You could either add an add-a-leaf to the rear springpack, or add a longer shackle (or both for that dragster look). Keep in mind by doing this your tail-end will be up higher when driving w/o the loaded hitchrack.

If you want to take the time to adjust the headlights each time, that might be cheaper, but a more-frequent pain in the butt.

AAL's are the best solution for carrying extra weight, but if I were you I'd try and rearrange things so not all the heavy stuff is out back...not just because of the springs but because of the effect on handling from having all that weight so far behind the rear axle. As already stated, the AAL's will give lift in the back though.

Gain some weight

Seriously though - why not collapse back seats and distribute load more evenly? hitch mounted rack isnt very good thing to get anyway - it puts load on frame where it shouldnt really be. Another thing is to put some of load on roof rack.