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I bought the 1400lb Equal-I-Zer because my tongue weight might conceivably creep over 1200 lbs AND the 1200lb hitch and 1400lb hitch use the same WD bars. The difference is in the hitch head itself.
You set the ball height based upon what the final ride height of the truck will be. It'd kind of a guess, but the directions say to basically find the static height of the trailer (just say 20" for example) and you set the hitch at 20" on the truck. Now add I believe 1/8" per 100lbs of tongue weight. So if you've got 1200lbs of tongue weight, you'd add 12/8 or 1.5" to the height of the ball. So you set the ball at 21.5". Pick the closest setting to that. Lower would be better.
You then adjust the cant of the ball with the washers AND the L-bracket height to get the amount of preload correct. Each one is a separate variable unto itself. One washer of cant just about equals one hole location on the L-brackets. You might also flip the links over that the L-brackets attach to if that will give you more adjustment. My trailer has an inverted tongue and I had to do that. Before I did, I was running out of adjustment. I flipped the links and I'm right back in the middle.
So you set the ball height to your best guess, start with five or six washers and set the L-brackets at the 5th hole and see what happens. Then just start playing with it. You do want the WD bars to be parallel to the ground, or as close to it as you can. So you basically get it that way with the L-brackets and then change the washers.
There are like 16 different settings you can get with this. But the idea is to make the front squat nearly equally to the rear. They recommend 1" of difference is OK, but you can get closer. I believe I have mine set up to drop the rear of the truck 1.5" and the front drops 0.75".
I'm pulling a 34' triple axle Avion with my Eq. Avion recommends you have the front of the trailer about 1/2" low anyway, and I'm just about exactly there. It's almost imperceptable. But it works. I pulled it 250 miles last weekend at speeds up to 80mph and she was steady as the rock of Gibraltar.
The Eq is a good rig if you get it set up right.
I wouldn't worry so much about the axle weight differentials. These don't sound too bad. You're not going to load the front axle as much as the rear, for a given equal amount of squat on both ends. Do your moment arm calculations and you'll see that your ratio probably isn't too far off.
Personally, I feel the Hensley is a sweet rig. But the Eq is great too. You just have to dial it in. If you're right at 1200lbs, I'd probably hang tight with what you've got. I'd bet good money that they have a generous safety factor built in.
But if you're really worried about it, what you really want is to have the CG of the trailer about 13% in front of the center point of your axles. So measure from the ball back to the midpoint between the two axles. Now come forward 13% and that's where you want the whole thing to balance. Now do the math based off your axle weights and jack weight. That will tell you where the CG really is. It may be that you're artificially nose heavy. If so, play around with the stuff you carry to shift the CG back enough to get it where it should be.
Excessively forward CG won't totally kill the handling, but it will really push up your tongue weight. Excessively aft CG WILL kill the handling, so be careful. But if you do it right, you might take a couple hundred pounds off the tongue weight and have your CG nailed right where it should be. I'd try that before dropping the $3000.
Oh, one last point. Be careful not to bend your A-frame by cranking in too much preload.
Best of luck,
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- Jim
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