What is the "real" GVWR?

Crespro wrote:
We are shopping for a trailer for our daughter and son-in-law. They bought a 2006 Ford Expedition with tow package.

The trailers we are looking at are UVW of about 6,000 and loaded weight of about 7,200, with maximum weight of about 8,000.

The projected numbers are:

GCVW of 14,500 with Ford at 6,300 and trailer at 7,300=13,600.

Tongue weight of 780 with max rated of 895.

Trailer weight of 7,300 with max trailer of 8,000 and TV of 8,900.

I am new to trailers, so am asking if this looks good?

Two thing IMO to watch out for ...

1. The 14,500 GCWR is more of a performance rating, but IMO going much over around 80% of the GCWR for a vehicle can make for a less than desirable towing experience especially in less than optimum towing conditions.

2. That 895lbs I believe is the receiver rating when using a WD system and the wt. of the WDH (around 100lbs typically) goes against that receiver rating leaving you a dead tongue wt. limit of around 700lbs which using the 12 to 15% of the TT wt. gives you a loaded trailer wt. max of between 4700 (15%) and 5800 (12%). These numbers are a far cry from the 8900 max for the Expy I think we are talking about, but I think the specs say a max TT wt of 0-8900 and those do fall in that range. You will probably find that TW can vary a HUGE amount and a lot of the "dry tongue wts" shown in TT brochures and advertising can be severly under estimated. Going from say a 700 to 900lb TW to a 1200 to 1400 actual tongue wt. is not unheard of. The two remaining factors are the GVWR and RAWR of the Expy which you should be staying under.

As a WAG using 1000lbs of stuff to put in the trailer the UVW of the trailer then should be in the 3700 to 4800 range and that puts you in the lower end of a lot of the trailers size wise. You can certainly get a decent sized trailer in that range, but you have to look for them and be ready for compromises.

Larry