Half ton towing
Looking at these numbers and forums for towing and it is very annoying. Most of these trailers say micro or light but have 900 to 1,000 lb tongue weights. Basically, you need a 2500 to tow anything b...
Forum Discussion
Grit dog wrote:
@ Gdetrailer
"Towing ratings now days has very little to do with gear ratios for the most part."
Except that in Timmo!'s example, it is largely gear ratios and engine power that make the tow ratings near the same. It aint the chassis.
With the modern 8/10speed transmissions, gear ratios are far less important unless you are trying to push the upper limits of tow ratings...then it's usually better to jump from 1/2ton to 3/4ton anyway (or alternatively to a more powerful engine option).
In the old days (I think there was mention of a 2005), with a limited number of gears, a truck with a low numerical rear end ratio was more efficient when running empty but as soon as you hooked up a trailer, it often would be forced down a gear even on flat ground and since it was a big jump in gear ratio, it often left the engine RPM racing far higher than ideal. So if you were going to tow a lot of the time, a higher numerical rear end ratio would allow you to hold top gear and keep the RPM more reasonable while towing.
With 8/10 speeds, the change in gear ratio by dropping a gear is much smaller, so the truck can dial in much closer to the ideal RPM/HP range that is ideal for the engine.
