First Travel Trailer, help us out!
Hey guys and gals, My wife and I have been looking for a little over a year now for our first travel trailer. We have a towing capacity of 7200lbs with our jeep grand Cherokee Trailhawk. I thin...
Forum Discussion
The safest thing to do is to load the family up with everything in the vehicle you would have on a trip and go across the scales. That will tell you for certain what payload you have left. GVWR minus your scaled weight.
Once you have that you can determine what your payload will allow for a trailer assuming it doesn't exceed the trailer tow rating. For instance, if your GVWR is 6500 lbs and your scaled weight is 5700, then you have 800 lbs left for tongue weight. 800/.13 = 6153 lbs of trailer assuming your tongue weight is 13%. On my trailer the dry tongue weight was less than 600 lbs but every time I've measured it when loaded it is over 1200 lbs. Batteries, propane, gear etc. can really affect it. I've had 2 trailers and both tended to be around 15% or over.
If you can handle the tongue weight of a 6,153 lb trailer, then you also need to make sure your hitch is rated for it also. What is your hitch tongue weight limit? It is probably in the 6-800 lb range. Don't go over that for sure.
I'd be looking for a 4500-5000 lb empty trailer at most if my numbers (guesses) are correct. I think it would be very beneficial to weight the vehicle as I suggested, then you are dealing with facts, not guesses. Good luck!
Once you have that you can determine what your payload will allow for a trailer assuming it doesn't exceed the trailer tow rating. For instance, if your GVWR is 6500 lbs and your scaled weight is 5700, then you have 800 lbs left for tongue weight. 800/.13 = 6153 lbs of trailer assuming your tongue weight is 13%. On my trailer the dry tongue weight was less than 600 lbs but every time I've measured it when loaded it is over 1200 lbs. Batteries, propane, gear etc. can really affect it. I've had 2 trailers and both tended to be around 15% or over.
If you can handle the tongue weight of a 6,153 lb trailer, then you also need to make sure your hitch is rated for it also. What is your hitch tongue weight limit? It is probably in the 6-800 lb range. Don't go over that for sure.
I'd be looking for a 4500-5000 lb empty trailer at most if my numbers (guesses) are correct. I think it would be very beneficial to weight the vehicle as I suggested, then you are dealing with facts, not guesses. Good luck!
