Pulling Campers... BE CAREFUL!!!!

[Wrench]

Guys pulling bumper pull trailers that do not have 100% understanding of how important tongue weight is and how it affects trailer balance are primed to be this guy.

Set it level and run it mentality is horrible advice. With that said, it is possible to tow with a half ton, as long as you can get trailer balanced and enough tongue weight.

I tow a 11k lb arctic fox with a cummins and a powerstroke and when my tongue height is too high I know INSTANTLY. my rigs have on the fly adjustable air bags and if I over inflate them my sway is not reduced, its made worse.

Last piece of advice, barring their last political suicide, Goodyear endurance tires are USA made and substatantially better than the rest.

Have plenty of suspension, brakes, keep trailer brakes adjusted, balance your trailer and keep your speed controlled.....you'll be fine.

My wife doesn't feel it when our trailer pushes....but I do, because I don't want to be that guy.

 

[EastMT]

I bought a fish shack, 1000 sq ft house down in Homer. It was an estate, it came with a 90’s 36’ bumper pull, it slept like 10 people, heavy!

I put it up for sale, sold fast, a guy shows up in an older F150 that had the hitch on the bumper, I was like do you know the capacities for this thing? Nah, it’ll pull anything. Exhaust almost dragging, off he went to Kenai, wanted it for a fish shack. I never heard of any crashes that day but I expected it.

 

[Catahoula]

Excessive towing speed and inattentive driving as mentioned, even if weights are in check, goes on all the time regardless driving 1/2, 3/4, 1 ton trucks. Glad no one was injured or worse.

 

[tntrker]

I used to drive a big rig cross country every week for years. Seen lots of stuff. Saw a 1/2 ton getting on the interstate with a camper in tow. One of it's propane tanks was dragging the ground throwing sparks. Saw it go up in flames in the rear view mirror. Tried to help a couple about midway down a mountain pulled over on I-5 from CA, smoke boiling from their brakes. Pulled over, took my extinguisher and it burst into flames right when I got there. I'd put the flames out, it'd start right back up. Two bottles later, we just had to stand back and watch....

 

[Glendon Mullins]

And check your lugs and bearings while you're at it. Local guy had his new truck written off a couple weeks back by a little 205 travel trailer tire. 110km/hr trailer tire into the front of a truck doing 110km/hr....

Everyone should check their lug nuts, on m way back from montana a couple years back my truck got totalled by a tire that flew off some dudes subaru!!

 

[BluMtn]

If you travel a lot with your travel trailer you should run tire monitors. I have been running them for a couple years now after loosing a tire in a bad spot. Also I run 14 ply 16" tires on my toyhauler with 105 lbs tire pressure.

 

[Surgeon]

And I thought I had problems with 3 tire blow outs in one trip. Of course, I only had one spare. I replace my tires every three years, but they still ended up getting me. It's much cheaper to replace tires than to repair fenders after a blowout!

 

[loadsandlattes]

One thing not taken into account is tires. So many 1/2 tons have 4-6 ply on them, especially OEM tires, they put the thinnest, lightest tires on there for performance/MPG. If you are towing heavy with a light truck, I’d buy the HD tires, inflate them like a 3/4 ton, not what the truck sticker says at 35 or what ever, reduce pressure when not hauling.

I just towed 10,000lbs from AK to TX, 4300 miles with a 3/4 ton gasser. Never had a single wobble. I passed a 1/2 ton pulling a camper with it, and he was all over and I thought he was gonna take us both out. I could see his tire sidewalls flexing back and forth.

If you were around Lubbock, that could have been me. I borrowed a 30’ bumper pull for the weekend mule deer hunt and took it about an hour north. No trouble at all on the way up there. Tuesday I had to get back to town with a 30mph crosswind.

I did 50mph and was puckered every single one of those 65 miles. The tundra handles a utility trailer and UTV no trouble at 70mph. That camper though... wshew. Even for short distances, never again.

 

[Hoopwse]

If y’all are ever down in Florida go buy a 6 pack and a lawn chair and head to the nearest public boat ramp on Saturday morning. Straight up comical what you will see. Seeing the tow rigs some people use to try to pull their boat up a slippery boat ramp.

 

[KurtR]

Every year my trip west I hate the section from 30 miles west of Bozeman to Whitehall the amount of campers that are inches from blowing over is scarry

 

[hodgeman]

Back to my question and thought....What do you guys feel the Acceptable % of your tow rating to be used on a dry trailer weight is? IE...if you have a 10k tow rating, should you never go over 50%? 35%? Or is it higher? I feel like some standardized “dry weight percent of tow capacity” rating would help people understand that it’s not just pulling, but stopping, and controlling the load that’s the much more important part. Especially all the new uninformed folks out today trying to recreate outside.

Without breaking down all the math. 50% is probably a good number. For instance, a truck with a 10k tow rating is probably going to max out something else well before you get anywhere near 10k.

My truck is rated to pull 10,500 pounds and there's no way I'd hook up to something that heavy. I could pull it...but stopping it or controlling it is a completely different story. My 4000# camper tows fine, but even sticking an 800# ATV and a dead moose in it makes a huge difference in how it tows and it's still just 60% of rated capacity.

 

[EastMT]

About 200% seems like a good number


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk