Payload Capacity and Towing Questions
I Will start off by saying that I heavily researched the type of RV I wanted and was dead set on a bumper pull travel trailer over a fifth wheel. I wasn't ready to buy my RV yet but had to go ahead an...
Forum Discussion
864 wrote:
1. It appears the negative effects of exceeding the payload capacity of the tow vehicle are: possible legalities, wear and tear, and safety. Any others?
LOL...yeah its getting redundit or redundet or blather...bla...blab...anyways here goes. No bash meant op as we all had to have this explained at one time. Ford diesel forums can give you real skinny on F250/F350 srw same as/etc.
Anyways
1. possible legalities... (civil or legal) are being over a axle/tire load ratings or if your state has some type of weights for registration purposes (not all state do). Payload number or gvwr numbers aren't used for any civil or legal weight issues.
Wear and tear... these same exact trucks are worked hard every day by our commercial brothers and sisters right up to their max axle/tire loads ... and we do so for several hundred thousand miles. Those that want load the truck up and pull a rv can do the same.
NHTSA says this about components of the GAWR:
"Gross Axle Weight Rating is the rated load-carrying capacity of an individual axle and wheel assembly. (It represents the load that may be steadily sustained by the components in the system; i.e., tires, rims, hubs, bearing, axles, brakes, suspension, sub frame, etc. with the GAWR limited by the components with the lowest working rating".
Safety ....same answer as wear and tear.
The only way to determine how much load your truck can carry in the bed (pin weight/hitch/other gear/etc) is take it to a set of CAT scales and weigh the trucks front and rear axles separately. Many F250/350 owners report the truck rear axle can weigh in the 3000-3200 lb range leaving around 3100-3200 lbs for a in the bed payload.
Get'r weighed and you will know your exact payload numbers.
