Forum Discussion

newadventure's avatar
newadventure
Explorer
Aug 24, 2014

Newbie looking for lightweight

Hello everyone- I am a newbie, although lived in an airstream for a little while. My house is for sale and I want to live in my rv for awhile. Being on a limited income, I want to go lightweight and a 6 cyl. To be more specific, I plan to go where I want to go and stay there awhile and explore. Thus I don't want to be driving around a big V-8 with high gas prices. In the long run, I think it would save me some money. I would like you experienced rvers to give me your opinions on this. Recommendations, safety, and vehicles that you have had experience with. Is it worth it? Still need enough power to pull up hills, etc. I don't know if I am right or not but it makes sense to me.

22 Replies

  • I'd respectfully disagree! There are lightweight trailers made with better materials than the standard aluminum and wood beams that you could full-time in!
  • Light weight TTs aren't made to live in. They're very light, made with materials that can't really take long term use. Also, a V6 can't tow much. I tow a 16 foot Starcraft AR-ONE 14RB with my 2010 V6 4.0L Nissan Pathfinder (same basic platform as the Frontier, Tacoma, etc.) that weighs 2507 dry. I wouldn't tow a whole lot more with it; maybe up to 3200 lb. We used to have an Aliner, which towed GREAT with this vehicle, and was a breeze to set up, but its size and lack of bathroom caused us to sell it.

    I don't recommend the AR-ONE. DH and I just bought it and are already having issues (see separate post). We also looked at the Palomini 179bhs (wish now we'd bought it instead) and the R-Pod 179. I can't imagine living in any of these TTs for any length of time. There are others in the small class, but some were just a little too heavy for my SUV, and/or too wide, and/or too expensive for our budget.

    Remember that it's not just the weight of the trailer you need to consider. You also have to take into account the length and the frontal area of the TT (picture pulling a sail into the wind). For this reason, we only looked at 7 ft. wide TTs, rather than the standard 8 ft. wide ones, as well as under 21 feet long, b/c of our tow vehicle.