New To the Forum

[Alex_and_Tee]

New to the Forum and new to RV'ing (haven't camped since I was a kid with my parents and the wife never has). Wanted to take a moment introduce ourselves.

My wife Teresa and I are anxiously awaiting the arrival of our 2022 Tiffin Allegro Open Road 36 LA. It will be our new full time home and we are also purchasing a new 2021 Bronco Sport as our tow vehicle. The only downside to the Bronco is it needs to be towed on a trailer. We looked at the Trailblazer too which would have allowed us to flat tow (AWD) or dolly tow (2WD) but she fell in love with the Bronco ( the wife hates Jeeps).

So, my first question to you all is for those who tow a trailer, are there any/many issues regarding storage of the trailer when you are stationary?

[way2roll]

way2roll wrote:

Alex and Tee wrote:
Thanks for the information but it doesn't make sense that the tow capacity would have anything to do with the weight of the tow vehicle. I can't reasonably imagine that they would rate a MH to tow 5000 lbs and then you have to figure and subtract the weight of fuel, fresh water, black water, gray water, propane, cargo, passengers etc.

OOPs double post - maybe the mod can delete.

[way2roll]

Alex and Tee wrote:
Thanks for the information but it doesn't make sense that the tow capacity would have anything to do with the weight of the tow vehicle. I can't reasonably imagine that they would rate a MH to tow 5000 lbs and then you have to figure and subtract the weight of fuel, fresh water, black water, gray water, propane, cargo, passengers etc.

Why wouldn't the weight of the vehicle being towed factor in to the towing capacity? And that 5k towing capacity as advertised is the hitch rating. I could put a 5k hitch on a Miata, doesn't mean it can tow 5k. What's even worse, a lot of dealers won't touch the subject either because they don't know or don't want to disclose that a MH with a 5k hitch can only tow 2k. Either that or they give you false information. But yes, this is the case for MH's. They have to be weighed for travel and subtract the weight from the GCWR to arrive at what your tow capacity is. And it may or may not be less than your hitch. Often it is - especially on larger gassers because they have so many extras and extra weight simply by being larger. Example, a washer and dryer could easily make the difference between being able to tow your set up or not. All of this is moot if you don't care. Lots of folks on the road who never weighed their rig at all and take the hitch rating as gospel. I am not advocating you do that, but it happens - a lot. You get some folks on here that will give you the "it's fine, I've been towing a Sherman tank with my such and such RV forever with no issues" . My school of thought is, do it right or don't do it. There is risk, not only to the MH, chassis, and drivetrain itself, but to others should something fail or you don't have enough braking capacity. It may also invalidate a warranty issue should something fail because you are towing overweight.

[Alex_and_Tee]

Appreciate everyone’s input. I talked to a dealer today about a Featherlite and they wanted $9000 for a 16’ trailer. I told the guy he was out of his mind and could get one for $5400. Going to contact Nextrail in Ocala tomorrow. The price of Aluminum and all other materials has gone up quite a bit.

[ferndaleflyer]

A place in Ocala--Gainsville builds aluminum car trailers for cheap money. I looked at them and a 20ft one was under $5000. I ended up getting a 20ft Featherlite. I have been all over the country one trip to CA with a 45ft DP towing a 30ft enclosed car trailer. I am now down to 36ft DP with same 2 trailers and have never been turned away....never. Just get the trailer and carry on, you won't regret it.

[rlw999]

Alex and Tee wrote:
2022 chassis specs just posted on the Tiffin website. Hitch rating and vehicle tow weight still at 5000/6000 lbs for the 26,000 lb chassis. All that means is we can put 2000 lbs more stuff in the MH.

I think they have a typo in their spec page.

For the 24K chassis they say:

GAWR – Front: 9,000 lb
GAWR – Rear: 15,500 lb
GVWR: 24,000 lb
GCWR: 30,000 lb
Maximum Trailer Weight: 6,000 lb

The math works out for that chassis.

But for the 26K chassis:

GAWR – Front: 9,000 lb
GAWR – Rear: 15,500 lb
GVWR: 26,000 lb
GCWR: 30,000 lb
Maximum Trailer Weight: 6,000 lb

So I think that max trailer weight should be 4,000 lbs (GCWR-GVWR=4,000). (and also the GAWR should be 17,500 for the rear axle)


The max GCWR for the Ford F53 Chassis appears to be 30,000 according to Ford so that 30,000 GCWR seems to be correct for all of their F53 chassis.

I think though that as long as you don't load the RV up to the full 26,000 lbs you'd still be ok to tow up to the 5,000 hitch weight rating. Since you're towing a car trailer rather than flat tow, you wouldn't want to load up the RV to full GVWR anyway since you'll have 500 - 750lbs of tongue weight on the hitch which counts against the GVWR.

But that's one more thing to think about with trailer towing - what tongue weight is the hitch rated at? Some 5000 lb hitches are only rated at 500 lb tongue weight so you've got to have your car balanced perfectly on the trailer to ensure you don't exceed it (and you don't want to go under either, having much less than 10% tongue weight can make the trailer unstable, you want to stay in the 10 - 15% range)


I'd say that you should just ask your dealer about it, but you have to find someone that knows what they are talking about and maybe get them to put it in writing -- some salespeople will tell you anything you want to hear to make the sale and ultimately its your own responsibility to make sure your tow combination is safe.

[Alex_and_Tee]

2022 chassis specs just posted on the Tiffin website. Hitch rating and vehicle tow weight still at 5000/6000 lbs for the 26,000 lb chassis. All that means is we can put 2000 lbs more stuff in the MH.

[Alex_and_Tee]

Did a little research and I found this:

GVWR is the gross vehicle weight including fluids, passengers and cargo.

The GVWR of the motorhome is 24,000 lbs.

The GCWR is the weight of the vehicle, fluids, cargo, passengers and trailer with a load.

The GCWR of the motorhome is 30,000 lbs.

The max trailer weight is 6000 lbs. but the hitch rating is 5000 lbs. I found an aluminum trailer that is 16' long and weighs 1100 lbs. With the Bronco I'm at 4600 lbs. Under the hitch rating and total weight limits.

This is all based on the specs of the 2021 36 LA with a 24,000 lb. chassis. Mine is a 26,000 lb chassis so, even if the hitch rating is the same, I should still be good weight wise. Agree? Disagree?

[Alex_and_Tee]

Thanks for the information but it doesn't make sense that the tow capacity would have anything to do with the weight of the tow vehicle. I can't reasonably imagine that they would rate a MH to tow 5000 lbs and then you have to figure and subtract the weight of fuel, fresh water, black water, gray water, propane, cargo, passengers etc.

For instance a pick-up truck is sold with a tow rating of "X" lbs. I don't think you would have to then subtract the weight of 4-250 lb passengers and a load of stone in the bed to determine whether or not you can tow a backhoe to a job site.

That said. I know zero about this subject and am deferring to those who know much more than I but, common sense (to me anyway), would seem that the tow rating would be based on a nearly fully loaded tow vehicle.

Curb weight of the Bronco Sport Big Bend model (the one we are looking at) is just under 3500 lbs. so a 1500 lb. trailer should squeak me by. We plan on staying in the southern half of the US so mountain climbing won't be an issue.

[way2roll]

Alex and Tee wrote:
Yes that is one thing I have been asking Tiffin for is the tow specs. The unit we ordered is on a 26,000 lb chassis with liquid springs which is new for 2022. 2021 and earlier are on a 24,000 lb chassis with a 5000 lb tow rating. I’m not sure if the the heavier chassis brings a higher tow rating or not. No one at the dealer or Tiffin can seem to answer that. I’m pretty sure I will have to go AL on the trailer or at least get one that only has two ramps for the tires like a U-Haul rather than a full flat bed to keep the weight down.

Welcome to the forum.

You'll have to do the math to see what you can tow. It's not a hard and fast answer. Just because the hitch says it's rated for 5k lbs does not mean you have that much capacity once the rig is loaded for travel. Even empty some MH's don't have capacity to match the hitch rating.

You need to weigh the MH for travel, but since you don't have it in your possession you'll have to go with what you know. A sticker in the MH should tell you the weight leaving the factory, you can guess at what cargo will be.

But to get your towing capacity, it's the LESSER of the 2:

Hitch rating
OR
GCWR minus GVW.

For your gross vehicle weight (GVW), it is: Curb Weight + Cargo Weight + Water Weight + LP Weight + Passenger Weight, Food, Clothes, etc.

So if you have a 5k hitch, and after loaded for travel your capacity is 2k, then you can only tow 2k - regardless of what the hitch is rated for.

Put more simply, your MH has a combined weight rating (should be on a sticker). You need to subtract from that number the weight of your MH loaded for travel. You will also need to know the weight of the vehicle you are towing plus the trailer. If the combined weight rating minus what your loaded MH weighs is less than your tow vehicle plus trailer, you can't tow it.

Example, if you have a 26k lb chassis, and your MH loaded for travel weighs 23k, you only have 3k towing capacity.

If your MH weighs 20k, you have 6k capacity - but - the hitch rating is 5k, so that's the lesser of the two. So you can still only tow 5k max.

You'd be surprised to learn how many MH's come off the line with almost no towing capacity at all - despite having a 5k or even a 7 or 10k hitch.

[dodge_guy]

Welcome.
Full time! I would want a flat towable vehicle. A trailer is going to have huge hurdles at most campgrounds. The Jeep’s are the most popular to tow. I tow a 13 Explorer. Not sure if the new ones are flat towable. I don’t full time, but if I did, I wouldn’t want to have the hassle of a trailer to maintain, hookup, and load a car and check the straps every so often.

[Alex_and_Tee]

Yes that is one thing I have been asking Tiffin for is the tow specs. The unit we ordered is on a 26,000 lb chassis with liquid springs which is new for 2022. 2021 and earlier are on a 24,000 lb chassis with a 5000 lb tow rating. I’m not sure if the the heavier chassis brings a higher tow rating or not. No one at the dealer or Tiffin can seem to answer that. I’m pretty sure I will have to go AL on the trailer or at least get one that only has two ramps for the tires like a U-Haul rather than a full flat bed to keep the weight down.

[rlw999]

Alex and Tee wrote:
My wife Teresa and I are anxiously awaiting the arrival of our 2022 Tiffin Allegro Open Road 36 LA. It will be our new full time home and we are also purchasing a new 2021 Bronco Sport as our tow vehicle. The only downside to the Bronco is it needs to be towed on a trailer.

Be careful about towing weight.

Tiffin says that the hitch on that RV is rated for 5000 lbs, but at least the chassis is rated for 6,000 lbs, sometimes they go the other way and the hitch is rated higher than the towing capacity (like the 36PA is rated for 4,000 lbs towing capacity).

The 2021 Bronco Sport has a curb weight of around 3,600 lbs, so you'll need to stay under 1,400 lbs with the trailer (which you can do with a lightweight aluminum trailer) if you want to stay under the hitch rating.

If you travel over many hills, you're sure going to be giving that engine a workout with that much weight. At least it's the new, slightly more powerful V8. You'll be close to 30,000 lbs depending on how heavily you load up the RV.

[chuckftboy]

Congratulations on your new rides. Have you chosen a trailer yet? A steel tandem axel trailer is pretty heavy and you will be hard pressed to find an aluminum one for less than half of your tow set-up quote. I think the Bronco Sport weighs in at around 37,000 lbs. so you may be over the tow rating of your new 36LA with steel.

[LouLawrence]

^^^^^^^^^^^^^^This^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^
UNLESS, you don't plan to change locations very often.