2012 f250 Diesel Engine Fifthwheel towing

losmt21 wrote:
Everyone.

I am glad to be a part of this formum. I have seen some really good questions get answered and I firmly believe this discussion. I wanted to ask a couple of questions concerning fifthwheel towing. I have a 2012 F250 Diesel short bed with 3.55 gears. I am currenly looking at purchasing a 2014 gateway (heartland) Fifthwheel. The Dry weight is 11,000 and the Gross total weight 14,000. The pin weight will be 2070 lbs. My truck is 10,000 I was wondering if I would have enough truck to pull this camper? 90% percent of the time I will be camping local within 15 minutes from my house. Maybe once a year travel outside of GA. Reading from my door are Front #5940 and rear 6100 from the sticker on my door.

I just sold my 2012 F250 shortbed. when I weighed it empty, the rear axle weight was 3380. so 6100-3380 = 2720. so a pin weight of 2070 would leave u about 650 lbs to carry on the truck axle. (people, stuff in the bed, and any extra weight put on by stuff in the trailer).

the 10,000 is a paper statement, cause the rear axle, brakes, tires are the same as the 350. if you look at the tires they are rated at 3680/tire (@80 psi). thats 7360. the 350 with the 11500 gvwr has a RAWR of 7000. so an additional 900 on the same tires.

so, you will be close to the max carry weight. the gcvwr is 23500 on both the 250 and 350, so you can PULL and STOP a lot. my truck weighed 8830 empty.. of its 10000 limit. so 23500-8830 = 14670.
so you will be close but not over there.

you WILL want to add some additional spring support in the rear. as they softened the 250 springs to make it more 'comfortable'.
I added Firestone airbags to mine.

many of my friends on the ford truck forums http://ford-trucks.com/forums/forum205 tow large with 250's. I wasn't comfortable myself being right at the edge.

I moved up to a 2012 350 dually as the trailers we are looking at have a near 3000 pin weight and almost 16000 gvwr.
(I miss my 3.31 gears tho!)