1st time TT owner, with questions
My husband and I love to camp, but with a 2 year old (and hopefully one more child in the next year or two), we wanted something a little more "enclosed" than a tent -- particularly for naps and earli...
Forum Discussion
Just looked at the specs for this trailer- dry weight given as 2600, gross 3500- correct? Link to source
Main thing that jumped off that spec page was tongue weight- 180 lbs is in my opinion too light for stable towing of a trailer in that weight range. Rule of thumb is around 10% of actual trailer weight. It may be that given dry weight does not include such things as propane bottles/battery, which are often tongue mounted, although from the shape of the trailer's nose I don't see how that would be possible-? Picture posted below...
In any case, I think it likely that you'll be very close to the stated maximum once loaded for the road, so should strive for a tongue weight of 300 pounds or more. I change things around a lot depending on who's coming on trips, so periodically weigh my (very small) trailer's tongue on an old bathroom scale that I picked up at a thrift store. I found a dial-type one that goes to 350 pounds and it works great. Digital scales don't work well for this purpose, for some reason.
As for total weight:
You can do that at any highway scale/landfill/mill. You don't have to weigh the trailer every time you go out- doing it once with everything in it you'd likely take with you is enough. After that you'll have a pretty good general idea of how to distribute weight.
Main thing that jumped off that spec page was tongue weight- 180 lbs is in my opinion too light for stable towing of a trailer in that weight range. Rule of thumb is around 10% of actual trailer weight. It may be that given dry weight does not include such things as propane bottles/battery, which are often tongue mounted, although from the shape of the trailer's nose I don't see how that would be possible-? Picture posted below...
In any case, I think it likely that you'll be very close to the stated maximum once loaded for the road, so should strive for a tongue weight of 300 pounds or more. I change things around a lot depending on who's coming on trips, so periodically weigh my (very small) trailer's tongue on an old bathroom scale that I picked up at a thrift store. I found a dial-type one that goes to 350 pounds and it works great. Digital scales don't work well for this purpose, for some reason.
As for total weight:
You can do that at any highway scale/landfill/mill. You don't have to weigh the trailer every time you go out- doing it once with everything in it you'd likely take with you is enough. After that you'll have a pretty good general idea of how to distribute weight.
