Towing My Cherokee 26BH Safely

Yes as APT said.
You will add more weight than you think. And will you really be towing with 2 full tanks? Doubt it. No one I know of would travel any farther than the dump station with full tanks!

You will be fine though! 70 mile round trips are nothing.

4500 pound dry bunkhouse will be 5500 pounds loaded for a long weekend with the family, maybe 650 pounds of loaded TW. Any weight adding in front of the trailer axles increases TW. Any weight added behind the axles removes TW.. I'll assume you plan to eat - take food and cooking/eating stuff. Clothes, toys, camp chairs, towels, etc. It all adds up. 70mile trips are fairly low risk, so take it slow.

This is my first time pulling a 29 ft camper so any advice I welcome... should I always pull camper w empty water n sewer tanks?

Slate CM has my TT link... it shows 4541 lbs dry... but what would the tongue weight be? I dont see us adding over 100 lbs of cooler/ bicycle weight and a new battery... how much would this extra weight plus 2 full tanks add as tongue weight to the TT before towing? Surely not over 50 lbs...should My truck have 10 ply tires? I dont c towing over 70 miles each way...to a camp site from home...just had my trucks transmission rebuilt 2800.00 told em to rebuild for towing... what does my trucks Max Towing Capacity = 10,000 lbs mean?

Ahh, that model would be a better match. Again, there are a lot of unsafe 17 year old abused pickups. Make sure your isn't one of them.

Welcome to the forum!

Without knowing the numbers I'll say you will be fine. I towed an 05 Cherokee 28ft, 6500lb loaded With a 97 Dodge conv. van with the 5.9 and 3.90 gears.

Enjoy!

Set up the hitch right and you should be good to go...make sure you have the transmission cooler.

Thanks!

Jeremiah

I would guess this is the one OP is asking about: https://rvwholesalesuperstore.com/forest-river/cherokee/grey-wolf/26bh/

With a dry hitch weight of 402 and vehicle at 4,500 it should be fine.

Is this your model? If so, then I estimate you will be towing about 7500 pounds with over 1000 pounds of loaded tongue weight. I do not think you will be happy with that combination. That was pushing the capabilities of that truck when new - 17 years ago. How well the truck was maintained will be most important to well comfortable towing with it. Springs, shocks, bushings, all the fluids should be relatively fresh. Get a proportional brake controller and WDH with integrated sway control.

You should be OK as that Dodge had a large enough payload rating in 2 wheel drive. The 4 x 4 option would subtract from that but not by much.

Here's the math: Establish truck's payload rating. From that, subtract the tongue weight of the trailer, the WDH weight itself, any cargo hauled, the weight of passengers. If your total is a positive number, you're good to go.