What am I missing on GVWR??

larkyblast wrote:

Thanks Brad, I appreciate this.
This is the main attraction to me to the northstar liberty, the 7' floor length. The main drawback of course is the 13 hour drive to buy it sight unseen.
I thought about it a lot last night and if I get the bigger camper, I will give up on towing my bigger trailer at the same time. I think I'd still be fine towing our smaller trailer since I can move it by hand, tongue weight is probably 50lbs.
AS luck would have it though, a dealer in my city just got the Cirrus 820 and 720 in stock!! I can't believe this. Now I can go see both units and decide on the 720 or the Northstar. I was only considering the much heavier 820 because I could not find a 720 closer than Utah. I am leaning to northstar but the dollar just went down again so it's becoming more and more expensive.

Brad what do you think about the 8' camper but with a camper that is 1000 lbs lighter? The Cirrus 720 is supposed to be 2600lbs loaded (same weight as the northstar, just a foot longer), so even with my bigger trailer might be ok.
Going to look at both Cirrus this weekend!

Lighter is better. Moving the camper CG forward is better. A shorter hitch extension is better. Less trailer tongue weight is better. Using a WD hitch is better........etc.

We originally hauled our 9' 10" 2,600 lb claimed weight (4,000 lb actual) on a 1996 F-250. We hauled it many times from Alabama to Colorado or Yellowstone and never had an issue with tires, axles, etc. Having said that, did it drive that great on the interstate? No, it rocked around quite a bit. Was it fun to drive? Not really. Was it tolerable? Yes.

What I'm saying is, if you don't plan on trying to also tow that heavy trailer, you would likely be OK with any of those campers if you do the following:

stay within the tire ratings
keep good tires on your truck
stay within the axle ratings
make sure your camper CG is in front of the rear axle
drive very conservatively
expect the truck to drive quite differently than it does empty
expect to want to make suspension mods like Rancho shocks, air bags, Timbrens, etc.
expect the camper to weigh 1,000 lbs more than factory dry weight
take your truck to a truck scale and weigh it empty, weigh the axles separately
calculate how much weight will be on each axle