5th wheel hitches

[Licreek]

So now my second post. What about 5th wheel hitches. I saw a YouTube Video of the Reese sidewinder air ride unit and it looked awesome. I have a ford f350 with a 6.5' bed. now this hitch aint cheep, so my question is, is it worth it? I will be pulling a 28' Prowler with single slide. Also i need a hitch for the bed and was looking for recommendations. Whats the best set up for short bed 5th wheel towing? Thanks, Lee

[C_B_]

Pullrite latch wraps 140 degrees around the pin totally enclosing the pin in the latch. There is only.030" tolerance between the king pin and the latch - minimizing the "bump" felt while towing.


C.B.

[BB_TX]

I like the wrap around latch that encircles the king pin such as my Reese Elite has and my previous Pullrite Super 5th had. May be some others with similar wrap around patching mechanisms.

[Durb]

I would look at the Blue Ox Super Ride hitch. It is new and I haven't seen any reviews but it looks like it checks most of the boxes: relatively lightweight, 11" of articulation for clearance, rubber shock absorption and about $500 less in cost. One drawback is that it is manual so you have to pivot the hitch rearward before backing. Very interesting design.

[Learjet]

stevem4134 wrote:
While this may be a little off topic. The question I have is not related to a specific brand of hitch (at least I don't think so). What is the better, safer and more reliable hitch: one with jaws (single or double) or one with a bar that goes all the way across the pin?

You could argue that one jaw could fail on the B&W and the pin would still be held in place. So that would mean the B&W has redundancy.

[Community Alumni]

While this may be a little off topic. The question I have is not related to a specific brand of hitch (at least I don't think so). What is the better, safer and more reliable hitch: one with jaws (single or double) or one with a bar that goes all the way across the pin?

[BB_TX]

You could buy a less expensive manual sliding hitch. And use it when you really need to. But you would have to be aware of your turns. Or a more expensive auto slider so you would never have to worry about it.
Your 27 footer is probably not all that heavy and an air ride hitch or air ride pin box would be more a luxury than a necessity. All just a matter of how you want to spend your dollars and how many of them.
All IMHO of course.

[2001400ex]

Licreek wrote:
thanks. whats an SCT?

https://www.sctflash.com

It's a tuner where it can get custom tunes for the mods that you do, make the engine run cooler and transmission shift better. The enemy of the 6.0 is heat. Read through the ford-trucks forum for a few hours.

[Licreek]

thanks. whats an SCT?

[2001400ex]

Since you have the 6.0, first thing I'd do is get an SCT with custom tune, block the EGR, replace the downpipe and put in head studs. After that I'd put in a B&W turnaround ball and buy the Anderson ultimate hitch. It's offset so you should be good on your cab, not sure on older fifth wheels tho. Either way, look at that system so you don't have to worry about rails in your bed or anything.

[Licreek]

The truck I have is 06 ford quad cab King Ranch 6.0DS. I am starting from scratch, I will need to buy the pin box rails hitch the whole kit and ka-boodle. the fw we are looking to buy is a 05 27' prowler and it is the squared off flat front nose. just not sure if a fw this size needs the Reese sidewinder airride unit, just the hitch is like 2 grand? But we are planning on going full time so if it helps with the parking stress ill buy it.

[cummins2014]

Licreek wrote:
So now my second post. What about 5th wheel hitches. I saw a YouTube Video of the Reese sidewinder air ride unit and it looked awesome. I have a ford f350 with a 6.5' bed. now this hitch aint cheep, so my question is, is it worth it? I will be pulling a 28' Prowler with single slide. Also i need a hitch for the bed and was looking for recommendations. Whats the best set up for short bed 5th wheel towing? Thanks, Lee

Andersen, Andersen, Andersen. Do yourself a favor,and at least review them . It would be a great hitch for that shortbed truck, and the trailer.

[BB_TX]

Just like trucks, everyone thinks their brand is the best. Good friend had a short bed Chevy, an older 5er with square front corners, and a non sliding hitch. Knocked out his back window on a tight back in turn. Bought a newer 5er with contoured front corners and no more problem with the same hitch. Although he was also a little more careful.

You can get air ride hitches and you can get standard air ride pin boxes to soften the ride.

[Second_Chance]

You will get about as many opinions as there are brands and models of hitches. A little more info is needed in order to start to answer your questions, though. Year of truck and is it equipped with the Ford OEM puck system? Year of fifth wheel, design of front cap and placement of pin box (is it an older, squared-off front or one of the newer rounded and sculptured molded front caps)? Does the pin box stick out in front of the front cap or is it tucked back under.

The reason all of this is important is that not every fifth wheel requires a slider or a SideWinder for a 6.5' bed. We pulled a late-model fifth wheel (contoured front cap, forward pin box) with a fixed hitch on a short bed truck and had no problems at all. An older, square front end on the trailer would have taken out the back of the cab.

Rob

[C_B_]

Been using my Pullrite 16K Super Glide automatic slider to pull 35' and 40' 5th wheels for over 14 years.

No need to change pin box.

Here's a link.

www.pullrite.com



C.B.