Trailer nose pitch - where should it be at?

[SpaceRat]

When you are towing a trailer, I know the nose should be pointed up, but is it OK to be pointing down a little? What is the correct pitch that you should be at?

 

[smritte]

The answer is going to be based on whether or not you have brakes. Early trailers didn't have brakes. When you stop, the weight will push the back of the tow rig based on how its pointing. You also need to factor in weight shift from the tow rig. When you stop a vehicle the nose drops and weight shifts forward. This lightens and raises the rear of the vehicle.
If you don't have trailer brakes, the weight of the trailer is now pulled upwards. If your not braking perfectly straight, you have a chance of the trailer jack knifing you.
If you have brakes, when you stop, the trailer forces the tongue down, adding weight to the rear of the tow rig, stabilizing it.

Quite a bit of my towing is offroad. On the street, my trailer tongue is slightly down from level. This is incase I lose my trailer brakes. When I go off road, I flip my hitch over and raise the tongue to point slightly upward. This is for clearance when I tow through a big dip.
Off road I also move weight to the rear of my trailer. This puts the tongue weight about zero. The more tongue weight you have, the more your tow rig rear suspension has to deal with. Some off road trailer manufactures run 200-300 pounds of weight on the tongue. I run about 70 on the street. The more weight on the tongue, the more the trailer forces the rear up/down, side/side.

So..do you have good trailer brakes? If so, level is ok, slightly down is ok but don't put it up unless your offroad.

Years ago, I had a 1990 Toyota ext cab pickup with a shell on the back. I was pulling what was the equivalent of a Harbor Freight 4X6 trailer (no brakes) with my Quad on it. Total trailer weight with quad was about 600 pounds.
Something happened on the freeway and I had to do a hard stop from about 50 mph. I was fine until I slightly turned the wheel. The trailer jack knifed me. The hard stop was enough to shift most of my weight forward and raise the rear. Because the truck had a small lift, the trailer pointed up slightly and that's all it took. That was my life lesson on tongue angle.