Towing with a Tahoe

Thanks for those replies to Suburban vs Tahoe. Some of you talked about porposing or I call it a pogo stick ride. Very familiar with that but only in Wisconsin around Madison. It is not tolerable makes you dizzy sick leaving a evening of oamping the worst ever. I suppse the tahoe would be the same or worse for this again due to wheel base. I have been hashing this over for a year or two, enjoy the Tahoes length which fits my garage pickups don't. Your answers convinced me to stay with a suburban maybe even jump to the 6.3liter. Good luck this summer should be interesting with everyone suspecting everyone else of having the bug and wearing those masks. Taking the RV thru the drive thru could prove to be interesting since we can not go in. Dennis

This 27' Wildwood is a rear kitchen floorplan, with a front bedroom, so it certainly could be heavier in the back. Refer is mounted against the back wall and it is a mid bath.

Another factor we could not eliminate causing the sway was if the Tahoe's tires had really flexible sidewalls. Wheels and tires are 20" OEM stock size, all we did was inflate the tires to max tire mfg psi., with no improvement.

The coil spring factor is a interesting possibility. That Tahoe really rode well with no trailer.

This 27' Wildwood is a rear kitchen floorplan, with a front bedroom, so it certainly could be heavier in the back. Refer is mounted against the back wall and it is a mid bath.

Another factor we could not eliminate causing the sway was if the Tahoe's tires had really flexible sidewalls. Wheels and tires are 20" OEM stock size, all we did was inflate the tires to max tire mfg psi., with no improvement.

MY BIL bought a TT late last year which I posted/asked pretty much the same question considering the TT is in low 30' range. Have to go back to Sept or so to find my thread ("Would you....").

bikendan wrote:

blofgren wrote:
Would the coil spring suspension on the Tahoe possibly make it handle worse than the leaf springs on the 1/2 ton pickup? I do notice our Yukon is a bit "squishy" at times because of the soft suspension designed for the good ride. Ours has the Autoride as well which likely doesn't help much lol.

Not aware that Tahoes have coil springs. Thought they had leaf springs.

blt2ski wrote:
I have yet to see a Tahoe with coils on rear.

The GM full size SUV's have been running coil springs on the rear since the 2000MY.

blofgren, hard to answer your question. How was the spring designed? A big huge thick wire that makes one coil to carry half of the rated axle rating? One big thick leaf with super stiff material? Or was it multiple leafs with a less stiff material?

In my opinion, the GM SUV's will handle the weight they are rated for. Ride quality will start to degrade considerably the more you exceed those weights.

I have yet to see a Tahoe with coils on rear.

blofgren wrote:
Would the coil spring suspension on the Tahoe possibly make it handle worse than the leaf springs on the 1/2 ton pickup? I do notice our Yukon is a bit "squishy" at times because of the soft suspension designed for the good ride. Ours has the Autoride as well which likely doesn't help much lol.

Not aware that Tahoes have coil springs. Thought they had leaf springs.

Would the coil spring suspension on the Tahoe possibly make it handle worse than the leaf springs on the 1/2 ton pickup? I do notice our Yukon is a bit "squishy" at times because of the soft suspension designed for the good ride. Ours has the Autoride as well which likely doesn't help much lol.

Another thing I thought, which would be exaggerated by a short wheelbase is even with decent tongue weight, if the trailer axles are maybe a bit forward of ideal location and there is a high concentration of weight at the far rear end of the trailer, it will act like a pendulum.

Assuming trailer same and only the rigs changed, icbw and the wheelbase may have had more effect, but it shouldn't have been night and day between a 1/2 ton pickup with slightly longer wheelbase.

Grit Dog, good observation on the tongue weight. My neighbor never weighed the tongue on the Wildwood, but we did tow it with a 2000 1/2 ton Silverado 4x4 with a 5.3 + towing package and there was no sway. My apologies for not remembering that we tried a 1\2 ton PU with much better results than the Tahoe. This happened 3 years ago. He bought the diesel because they may go with a 5th wheel someday.