What am I missing on GVWR??

Grit dog wrote:
What you're missing is knowledge about your vehicle and it's components.
You can do a whole lot more with your truck (even though you didn't say what year it is) for a whole lot less than $5k in "upgrades", even if you pay someone a fair price to install a couple upgrades.
For starters, you don't even have as heavy of tires as the truck came with, but now 17" truck tires are extinct in any heavy load ratings.

Do some more research on your truck instead of campers and I believe you'll find it's easier and more economical to upgrade your truck a bit than find/order customize a camper to fit a need that is not a real need.

If you read even only the TC forum on here, you can extrapolate enough information to make an informed decision.

Thanks, I've done everything you recommend already. I've spent hours reading on here and other forums, articles in adventuring and truck camper magazines, snowmobile trailer magazines, you name it. Reading through the spec sheets for all the Ram trucks. They all say the same thing: that airbags, suspension upgrades and tires (things you are suggesting) do nothing to change your GVWR. What you're suggesting is that I just don't understand how to change the limitations of my truck, but my research says that you can not change those limitations, you can only changes how it feels to drive and prevent blowing out your rear suspension.

What has been really helpful here, is that pretty much no one uses the GVWR that is posted inside the door, and that the weight on each axle is far more important. This greatly increases my load capacity. It has also helped me to understand that most people think they can increase the weight carrying capacity of their vehicle by changing their dynamics. I am not an engineer so I don't know. I notice no one mentions upgrading their brakes.

I think I've provided more than enough information about my truck, except that I forgot the year: 2012. What else do I need to know other than the front and rear axle rating, the truck weight and the tire ratings? I am not a mechanic or engineer, so I am trying to educate myself to the best of my ability. Even on threads on this forum I've seen people argue up and down that you can't exceed the GVWR and others say it's the only way to go....and that's why I'm asking that specific question. I did all of this before looking at campers, and was genuinely curious why the numbers I had calculated didn't match with what I was seeing on people's trucks and what the salesman are telling me I can buy. First thing they ask is what truck I have then show me a bigger camper.

The tires are the ones my truck came with. It is a 2012 3500 SRW with only 30,000kms on it.

I have researched the price of the wheels, tires, hellwig rear sway, timbren air bags ect. To add the hellwig would be the cheapest at around $250.00 IF I could do it myself, which is a huge maybe. Tires would be min 300$ each if I kept my OEM wheels, so that's 1200 right there. Nito does make 17's. Air bags over $1500, Timbren suspension upgrade $650. So now I'm already at $3600 without new wheels or labour or the super hitch, add another $2000 for that if I did want to tow with one of the bigger campers.

Anyhow, this was only to help me to understand why i have been encouraged over and over to exceed my GVWR when my previous reading always said to start there when choosing a camper. I've already definitely decided to go lighter, so I can keep my towing options more open. I am going to look in more detail at new tires.
Thanks again, a lot of good info here.

PS, I am not really limiting my camper selection because of size, more so because of features, I was just curious if I did change my mind about that.