Forum Discussion
dodge_guy
Feb 09, 2015Explorer II
Pwac1968 wrote:2012Coleman wrote:OP wrote:This statement is a little in the weeds as you most certainly have more weight being subtracted from payload then your yourself, a purse and a water bottle - its called tongue weight, and at 6500 lbs dry, that's around 850 lbs depending on what percentage you calculated it. This number goes up when you load the TT with gear so the rule of thumb is to go with the gross weight of this trailer which I see is 8500. At 13%, your tongue weight is 1105 lbs. Now add on the weight of the weight distributing hitch, propane and battery, and payload is non-existent/exceeded just by hooking up.
I can only answer a couple of those questions. First, the payload is 1500 lbs., but there was nothing in the car but me and a few random hair brushes, reusable shopping bags, my purse, and a water bottle so I should not have had a payload issue
Hopefully you now understand why tow capacity is a number that will never be reached as you typically run out of payload capacity before reaching tow capacity.
Keep this in mind when shopping for the new TV. Don't get enamored with tow capacity - it's a fantasy.
No, my original question was why I was having trouble getting speed with a completely empty trailer. Yes, I understand that all of those things add up but I wasn't towing a loaded trailer at that moment in time. Some of the comments went off in the weeds and I was trying to answer those questions the best I could with a completely empty trailer at that point.
LOL. Some people just don't understand that the GVWR of a trailer is not what the trailer actually weighs! As you stated and I understood, you were towing a dry trailer and you thought you had problems. Just turns out you were expecting it to drive like it does without a load.
FWIW my trailer weighs 7100lbs dry and 9200lbs loaded. I have a 4100lb CCC. If I used the GVWR I wouldn't be able to tow it with my X. But going by its ready to travel weight everything is good!
I used to tow a 6500lb loaded trailer with a 1/2 ton Dodge conv van and it did just fine. You have a newer more powerful truck and are towing about 1000 lbs more than I was with my older van. You will be just fine. Watch the tongue weight though. With. 7500lb loaded trailer your younger weight should be right around 12% which would be around 900 lbs. shouldn't be a problem if you load the trailer properly.
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