Trailer weight vs. towing capacity

Dry Weight does not include dealer installed options, propane, & gear may not also include battery weight. Advertised dry weight is a base trailer with no options for some companies...... Our advertised dry weight was over 500 lbs less than the yellow sticker.......

If your tow vehicle can tow the gross weight you are in good shape your tow vehicle should be able to tow more than the actual scale weight of the trailer by at least 15%.

No, you are right, they only want to tell you whatever it takes to sell trailer. I was just told that the trailer weight or towing capacity of truck only consisted of the trailer not any cargo or passenger weight and it really did not matter if I went over, the trucks are made to carry a lot more. I wish I could have recorded the conversation.

HMBdave wrote:
I'm just wondering if the RVing community has tried to do something about what is considered "dry weight" ? I think it would be beneficial to the manufacturer, dealers, and end consumer if that weight was for the trailer with all possiable options installed. I think It would make it easier for people to see those numbers and make simple addition of all thing caried in the trailer to find the total weight? If anything they might be lighter if the rv isn't fully optioned out.

Solution could be as simple as a RV dealer having the portable "roll on" scales that fit under each tire... That way buyers could see exactly what the RV weighs as it sits on the lot, without having to move it around a bunch... Seems like it would be a worthwhile investment for an *honest* dealer to make, but we all know how *honest* most RV dealers are - they don't WANT you to know real weights, they want you to believe what you are told, you know, you can tow that 10K trailer with your minivan.

I'm just wondering if the RVing community has tried to do something about what is considered "dry weight" ? I think it would be beneficial to the manufacturer, dealers, and end consumer if that weight was for the trailer with all possiable options installed. I think It would make it easier for people to see those numbers and make simple addition of all thing caried in the trailer to find the total weight? If anything they might be lighter if the rv isn't fully optioned out.

For military move purposes (we were told we could include "cargo" weight carried in our 5th wheel bunkhouse) we took out EVERYTHING from every cabinet, emptied every tank, emptied every under-belly storage, took extra bedding off of beds, etc. (Family of 5 - two adults and 3 kids)

Weighed the camper loaded and unloaded.

All the stuff we took out weighed OVER 3,000lbs. VERY eye opening experience regarding what the stuff weighs that we consider "nothing" and statements that we could "never" reach the gross weight of our campers...

Dry weight is only a starting point and not nearly as important as gross weight. In my case if I went by dry weight I would have way too small of truck and be seriously overloaded. Dry weight does not include propane, battery, or dealer added options & that's before you put your gear in it. Your "stuff" weighs more that you think.

My campers dry "yellow"sticker weight is 9600 lbs my gross weight is 14500, If my truck was rated to tow 10600 I would be seriously overloaded. The campers actual weight by the scales is 13800. :)

wow, I kmow I am in trouble, just bear with me please. need to find a bigger truck.
24ft trailer GVRW 7600 and I just weighed it at 7200.
wife packs everything.
only have GMC 1/2 5.3 3.73
loaded the back down also. carry 2 kayak on top.
OK weight is 7300.
GVWR for truck is 13000 overage by 1500
took short 80 mile trip and it DID handle ok. tried emergency stopping , did OK
did not want to take trip over weight.
drained water, took out gear and kayak. now OK.
I do want my toys, is it safe to use my truck, or is there a 1/2 ton out there with better cargo capability.

Or can someone suggest another truck. am I to far under to really need a diesel.
thanks

Campfire Time wrote:

Terryallan wrote:

However. the yellow sticker weight is the actual weight of the TT as it sits in front of you on the dealer lot. As it was built, with everything you see on it.

The OP asked about dry weight. Dry weight is an empty trailer without options. That is always a lower weight than the "As Shipped" weight on the yellow sticker.

I agree that few people tow their trailer at it's GVWR, but that's a more realistic number than the yellow sticker. But here's the reason the yellow sticker is almost as bad to go by as the fictional dry weight, the only time you will tow the weight of the yellow sticker is the day you drive it off the lot. After that you will be a minimum of 500# over that, and most people are probably going to add 1000# to it.

In most instances what people put in their trailers is going to put them closer to GVWR than Shipped Weight. If you use the GVWR, then you will ALWAYS be right. If you use the "As Shipped" weight, you may be closer to your capacities than you think. In the OPs case, if they get a trailer with a 4500# yellow sticker and add 800# of stuff, now they are at 5300#. Sounds OK, except for the fact that they have an SUV that may only have an 1100# payload. If the tongue is 13% or more, more than half their payload is gone. If they stick with a 4500# GVWR trailer, they'll still have a fighting chance at not using up their payload, and they'll enjoy towing far more.

I can tell you from personal experience, the more margin you leave between your towing capacities and the true weight of your trailer, the more pleasant the towing experience.

The yellow sticker is a place to start. To give you an idea of how much it will weigh once you put your stuff in it. The GVWR is more of a irevelant number. Think about it. Yellow sticker 4500 lb. GVWR 8000lb. Which do you think is more realistic? Why would I need to worry about the 8k GVWR when the trailer weighs less than 6000?
Answer. I don't.

Example. My TT was 4811lb from the factory. The GVWR is 7200lb. My TT weighs 5650lb ready to camp. Going by the irelevant GVWR I couldn't tow my TT. If I used the TT GVWR to size my TV. Loading the kids, firewood and bikes would put me over payload. But since I am 1550lb UNDER GVWR. I have no problem. So I use the more helpful yellow sticker to get me in the ballpark. Because I KNOW I will NEVER load the TT to the GVWR.

Only time I worry about the GVWR. Is when it is only 1000lb more then the yellow sticker.

I'm with Terryallen and atreis on this. Planning around GVWR is way to ensure you have "enough" tow vehicle when starting from scratch, I'll certainly agree to that, but when you've already got a tow vehicle and you're looking in to "how much trailer can I tow" I think selecting by GVWR is wrong. While I may have only towed my TT at it's yellow sticker weight once on the day I brought it home, I will never add 2500 lbs of stuff to that number to reach the GVWR. I think adding 1000-1500 lbs to the trailer's yellow sticker weight is a much more realistic way to estimate how much that trailer will weigh when fully loaded with water and ready to camp.

Now ignoring the vehicle's max rated towing capacity and basing your trailer selection on the vehicle's remaining cargo carrying capacity? That I'm totally in agreement with. You will run out of weight carrying capacity long before you hit the vehicle's max rated towing capacity. So for the OP, find out how much cargo carrying capacity your SUV has remaining after you factor in everything/everyone's weight and gear that you'll be carrying in the vehicle. This number is how much capacity you have left for trailer tongue weight. Let's say it's 500 lbs. Now since a TT's tongue weight should be 12-15% of its total weight, take 500 / 0.15 = 3333 lbs. That's the max weight of your loaded trailer. That's a low weight for a TT, so since it's a small one that means probably a small fresh water tank as well so use the smaller 1000 lbs of gear and water estimate and subtract that from 3333 for 2333 lbs. So in this example, you would be shopping for a camper with a dry weight of no more than 2333 lbs. If you never plan on towing with a full water tank, you can reduce the 1000 lb gear and water weight by your tank capacity + water heater capacity times 8 lb/gallon for density of water. But I recommend never leaving home without a full water tank!

TomHaycraft wrote:
Disregard dry weights. Period.

Use a trailer's GVRW ...

This REALLY depends on the trailer, and how you load. My trailer's GVWR is nearly 3000 lbs higher than it's dry weight - and it's a small hybrid without much storage. It'd take a quite a lot of effort to actually hit the GVWR on this trailer (even filling all three water tanks would only get you halfway there, and that's not something most people do). My fully loaded weight is about 2500 lbs lower than the GVWR.

For the OP: If you're not going to pay attention to what you load, give yourself 1000-1500 lbs depending on the size of the trailer. If you are going to be careful, but are still going to load steel-framed camp chairs, corn hole and the like, give yourself 750-1000 lbs. If you're going to be crazy anal about loading (me) you can go with less. If you plan to carry a full freshwater tank, add 500 lbs onto these numbers.

BTW - when picking a trailer keep in mind that short wheelbase, high center-of-gravy SUVs are not all that stable as tow vehicles - you'll likely not be happy if you get a long trailer even if the weight is fine.