Newbie Tow Vehicle Help

I agree both are too much trailer for that truck. Those tongue weights will be upwards of 1000-1100 lbs til your done, and possibly more. With your payload of 1500 lbs or less, that doesn't leave much for anything else. It might be capable but you won't like it much and you'll be over on your numbers pretty far till you're loaded up for camping. That Open Range particularly will prolly be close to 10K itself if you're like most people and pack on 1200 lbs of stuff.

On paper, it *might* be possible, but I can guarantee you it won't be a pleasant experience. Trust me. I toed that line with my F150 the first summer we had the travel trailer (only rated for 7300lbs, loaded trailer was 6500 IIRC) and it worked, but it wasn't a lot of fun. If I had known how much more pleasant of an experience it would be with the 3/4 ton pulling it, I wouldn't have waited until the second summer to upgrade the truck!! Night. And. Day. Honestly!!

Thanks for all the valuable feedback, really helping make the math more consumable. Need to be safe.

Some on here will tell you it can be done, however I just traded my 1500 up to a 2500. It is simply too much trailer.

A WD hitch won't magically increase your truck's payload. It actually adds to the amount being carried.

The OR 308 would be pushing your tow rating and receiver limit. I expect both would cause your truck to exceed payload/GVWR. See my post here for the key things to look for when estimating what weight to tow.

Look on the inside of the drivers door. There should be a yellow label with the payload capacity that reads something like "The weight of people and cargo should not exceed XXX". From this XXX payload you need to subtract the weight of all people, tools, firewood, bikes, etc in the truck and last, but certainly not least, the hitch weight of the trailer. My guess would be less than 900 lbs left for hitch weight. Loaded weight in my opinion should be no more than about 7,000 to 7,500 lbs. That means the dry weight should probably be about 6,000 to 6,500 lbs. Different trailers have hitch weights between about 10% and 15% so you need to run the actual numbers. I'm just giving my best quick estimate.

Perhaps this will help you understand better.

GVWR 6900 - 5384 Curb weight = 1516# cargo capacity. Problem is once you add family, fill the fuel tank, bed liner, bed cover, running boards and add some stuff to go camping with your truck will weigh around 6,000# (you can always weigh it at a truck stop to get the actual number. So GVWR of 6,900# - actual truck weight leaves maybe 900# (conservative) for the trailers hitch weight. Now if your truck loaded with family, fuel and camping gear weighs less than 6,000# your capacity will go up. So to get an accurate capacity you really need to weigh your truck.

While your truck claims a 10,200# tow rating that's with a stripped truck, 150# driver and a easy to pull trailer with a light tongue weight, not a box called a travel trailer (TT). The TT will have a tongue or hitch weight of 13-15% of the loaded trailer weigh. Say your WDH weighs 100# you have about 800# left for the trailers tongue weight. 800#/15% = 5,333# loaded trailer max.

Most people add 500-1000# of stuff to a TT so if you add 1,000# to the dry weight of the trailer you are looking you'll have an idea of what you are looking at. So that leaves you a dry trailer weight around 4,000#.

Hope that helps you find the "Holy Grail". Hope you can see how to run the numbers to find a TT within the limits of your truck.

Good luck and enjoy.

They both are, in my opinion. Those are 3/4 ton or HD/XD 1/2 ton trailers.

Thanks for the quick response

Does that apply to using a weight distribution hitch as well.

Are both too much trailer, or just the 308