Towing a large vehicle

Nutinelse2do wrote:

Jesshopes wrote:

Nutinelse2do wrote:

Mfan wrote:
I see full size pickups behind prevosts, they don't seem to have a problem

Prevosts have a 20k hitch. A far cry from what the OP is talking about. Just sayin.

OP... most vans are not capable of being towed 4 down. You would have to put it on a tow dolly, which would max out any Class A gas coach, since 99 percent of them have a 5k hitch. It’s not about power, it’s what amount the hitch can tow, and if it puts you over your max capacity.

If you don’t know what the CCC, GCVW, and other weights mean, see the RVing FAQ above. You will find most of the info needed there.

Thanks. I feel like I have a fairly good understanding of things like GCVW but sometimes with the used MHs it's difficult to find all of the numbers or know how accurate they are. Of course if we find a MH that seems like it is even close to what we are looking for we will contact the seller and get all of the details. After several days of looking up (what feels like a million) used MH listings and tracking down numbers I was just looking for a different way to get perspectives/info on the topic.

Can you switch out a 5k hitch for a 10k if the MH has the power?

As stated, it’s not about the power. Every motorhome has a GCWR.... Gross combined weight Rating which means the maximum allowable loaded weight of the motorhome and any towed vehicle.... It is unsafe, and not healthy for the motorhome to exceed that rating.

This includes passengers, water, fuel, supplies... basically everything in it, on it, and what it’s towing.

I understand that. We had to calculate the GCWR when determining what TT we could haul with our 15 passenger van...and of course we took everything into account including the weight of the TT when fully loaded for a 2 week trip and the weight of all of our kids who occupy the van. It is, though, about power to a certain extent. Our previous van was a 12 passenger (we only had 8 kids when we bought the TT) and it had a 5.4L engine. It didn't have the power to pull the TT. So we had to upgrade to a van that had a bigger engine.

It seems that 5K is a somewhat standard hitch regardless of GCWR...which not knowing the vehicle that the people who purchase the MH will want to tow the manufacturer can't know what the GCWR will be. If we purchased a MH that had a 5K hitch but the GCWR allowed us to tow our van could we swap the hitch out to a 10K so that the hitch would allow us to tow our van?