Lite weight 5th wheel

Dont listen to the inferior bumper pull crowd. Your on the right path and will have a VERY nice towing setup. Like said keep an eye on pin weight.

The Jayco HT line might be worth takin a look at. Jayco HT Fifth Wheels

Everyone would agree that you need to add extra lbs to dry pin weight for more accuracy. I will say however, when we bought our '06 Cedar Creek Silverback 33 LBHTS, it's dry advertised pin was 1800 and dry weight was 10,800 with max GVW of 13,800. Fully loaded for a week for 5 people, 1 dog, pin was just over 1900 and 13,000. So IMO, weights may differ greatly amoung mfr's.

That being said, here is a good example. Our new coach's weights from Mfr say: dry pin 2,888, empty 13,420, CCC 2532, max GVW 16,000. After we picked it up, went right to a CAT scale which resulted in: pin 2860, empty 14,000 (which leads to a CCC of 2,000). Fully loaded for a week (3 people, 1 dog, 1 cat), pin 3800, trailer itself 15,980 (which means we had 1980 lbs of stuff in it). Ironically, that means we had about the same amount of weight of stuff w/ old CC as well, BUT GAINED 1,000 lbs on pin which I feel has a lot to do w/ design of coach.

Second Chance wrote:

RobWNY wrote:
I have a new Salem Hemisphere GLX 286RL. It has a dry Pin Weight of 1625

"Dry" pin weights are useless. 23% of trailer's GVWR to estimate loaded pin weight on a fifth wheel.

Rob

I agree with you but I have no idea how to calculate what the loaded Pin weight would be on a 5th wheel when you have no idea what the OP is going to put in his camper and while it's parked at a dealer. At least the Dry Pin Weight gives the OP a starting point. It eliminates any 5th wheel that has a dry Pin Weight greater than what the OP needs. Care to share your thoughts on how an accurate Pin Weight is calculated without knowing what's going to be in the 5th Wheel and how to measure the exact weight of the Pin while the dealer is showing the units the OP is interested in? I can't say any dealer I've spoken with brought out a certified scale for me to get accurate readings before I made a decision.

RobWNY wrote:

Second Chance wrote:

RobWNY wrote:
I have a new Salem Hemisphere GLX 286RL. It has a dry Pin Weight of 1625

"Dry" pin weights are useless. 23% of trailer's GVWR to estimate loaded pin weight on a fifth wheel.

Rob

I agree with you but I have no idea how to calculate what the loaded Pin weight would be on a 5th wheel when you have no idea what the OP is going to put in his camper and while it's parked at a dealer. At least the Dry Pin Weight gives the OP a starting point. It eliminates any 5th wheel that has a dry Pin Weight greater than what the OP needs. Care to share your thoughts on how an accurate Pin Weight is calculated without knowing what's going to be in the 5th Wheel and how to measure the exact weight of the Pin while the dealer is showing the units the OP is interested in? I can't say any dealer I've spoken with brought out a certified scale for me to get accurate readings before I made a decision.

As you say, the only way to truly know is to load up and head for the CAT scales. However, a rule of thumb used frequently on all of the forums on which I participate (including Escapees where there are a LOT of old-timers) is to use 23% of the fifth wheel's GVWR for an estimated loaded pin weight. Time after time this has proven to be within a few hundred pounds once propane, batteries, and average contents in the basement and front bedroom are loaded. Looking at trailers where the advertised "dry" pin weight is only a few hundred pounds under the truck's payload will likely result in a situation where the truck's rear axle and/or tires are over their rated capacities once the trailer is loaded. Best to know what the likely maximum pin weight will be to stay within the envelope. Bottom line is that, no matter how capable the Cummins diesel is, the OP still has a 1/2-ton truck.

That said, I would agree with the other poster who suggested looking at the Grand Design Reflection 150 series. There are a several folks over on the Grand Design forum towing the 150 series (and some of the smallest "regular" Reflections) with the F-150s with the Max Tow and Max Payload packages.

Rob

2nd chance has a point here as I just broke out the calculator and punched in some numbers.

Here's what I came up with based off our coach. Max GVW is 16,000 x .23 = 3680 which is EXACTLY what we had last year fully loaded for our trip with the B&W hitch in "forward" position. With the hitch in rearward most setting pin was 3800. Now however, I don't know what Cedar Creek did to maintain pretty much same advertised pin wt as to fully loaded back in '05, but w/ the Heartland the 23% rule worked.

In addition to the Grand Design Reflection 150 series and the Jayco HT line others have mentioned, you might also look at the Winnebago Minnie Plus line. They have three 5th wheel floor plans. We just brought home the 27RLTS floor plan (with a dry weight of 8240, GVW of 9500, and dry hitch weight of 1320) a couple of weeks ago. We are towing with a brand new 2018 F150 Ecoboost with max tow (11,400 lbs) and max payload (2500 lbs) packages. We have over 800 miles on it already, and it is going very well so far.

The Jayco and Winnebago lines come with tow hitches on the back. I believe the Grand Designs do as well, starting with the 2019 models. The Jayco line also comes standard with Good Year Endurance tires. The dealer we worked with to buy the Winnebago agreed to take off the tires that came on the trailer and replace them with the Good Years before we even left the lot. He said the day he took them off, someone came in looking for new trailer tires and he sold the take-offs the same day and we got the tires we wanted included in the "out-the-door" price.

We had zeroed in on one of the floor plans in each of these lines and would have been happy with any one of them, but the Winnebago met our needs a little bit better in terms of some length limitations we had, and the dealer certainly made it worth our while to negotiate and buy from him.

Don't get too hung up on the GVWR. Instead, weigh your truck rear axle, then subtract that from the RAWR. That's the number to work with. You should be good with most any of the half ton rated fivers.

And if you're going to drive a Cummins, for gods sake learn how to spell it.

When dealing with the lite model FWs, the axles/springs under it can make the GVWR vary by a lot. You can have a CCC from 1,500 to 4,000, in which case, using the 23 percent of GVWR may be farther off than the dry wt. A little understanding about RV axle ratings, including tire capacities will help, when buying new, and can't use the scales.

Bill is right, good to know what is available on trucks rear axle, to better know if you can handle the pin wt of a particular FW.

BTW...some folks spell Cummins right, but say cummings when speaking.

Jerry

Cummings, Sorry it was a typo. I am very familiar with alot of engines, not many this small !!! I probably have a little more experience with machinery than most..