I hope I'm barking up the right tree

[KillerIsMe]

I have never owned a TT before, although in a previous life I pulled a two-horse trailer all over the Northeast. I was young and carefree back then, never gave towing much thought - just hitch and go. I'm not so young anymore and I care now so I've come here to ask your advice.

My TV is a 2014 Nissan Frontier V6 4WD with the factory tow package, and I'm not upgrading. I've had the truck since new, owe about $2500 on it, and it has just over 30,000 miles. It's a good every-day truck and I'm just not prepared at my age to turn a small amount of debt and a reliable known into a big amount of debt and an unknown. So I did the math on the truck's payload, added in myself, my wife, our daughter, the dog, and added in 70 extra "miscellaneous" pounds and I'm left with a maximum of 570 pounds on the hitch. Realistically I want to stay away from maxxing out so I'm trying to stay with a total hitch weight of 470 pounds or so.

We are trailer shopping and have funneled down our choices into our favorite, and that's a Venture Sonic Lite 168VRB. We went to look at one today and the real-world factory sticker shows the Sonic at a 250 pound hitch weight (dry of course), and a trailer weight of 3200 and GVWR of 4000. That unit has the options we want with the exceptions of TV and power tongue jack. The Nissan is rated to pull 6100 pounds, which I had no intention of doing, and as I said I have up to 570 pounds left of payload for the hitch. Can you folks help me out on this: am I OK with this combination? I will not be camping much more than 12 to 15 trips per year, and as we live in Northeast Pennsylvania we will stay mostly local.

Am I missing anything?

[KillerIsMe]

I might just have to give it a go. 61 years old, daughter is 10, wife says YOLO and I have to agree. I can't really afford (actually I CAN afford - I just don't want to) to buy a big new Titan, or F150, or whatever. My best friend died last year at 60 - never got to do some of the things he always wanted to do. Played it safe. I don't want to end up doing the same thing over a stupid travel trailer and something as trivial as a Nissan Frontier. What did it cost me - $25000? I don't think it's worth it for me to spend the next however many years agonizing over whether or not my truck will pull a travel trailer. If it won't it won't. I'll know by the end of this Summer and if it's a fail, well it's a fail. I'll look around for a big beater to pull it and call it a lesson learned. No matter what, it won't define my life.

[gmw_photos]

I owned and Loved a Nissan Frontier it did pretty well towing my 3550 Dry weight camper BUT my Frontier was a manual transmission and the (****) clutch could not handle backing up the camper.

I find that interesting.
My '06 Frontier is a 4.0 V6, 4WD, six speed manual. I bought it new. The truck has 134K miles on it. 50K miles of towing either the camper or two different horse trailers. Original clutch. Still works fine.

[MFL]

Well Dutch, the pics help, as the Sonic is quite streamlined. I looked at your profile pic of your parents trailer, and tow vehicle, and came to the conclusion that the Frontier, with Sonic in tow may be a better fit.

Great old family pic! I'm sure you have some lasting memories.

Jerry

[DutchmenSport]

Just so everyone can get a visual of exactly what a 'Sonic' is, here's some images: Sonic, click here.

Put this together with the 2014 Nissan Frontier. Here's some images: Nissan Frontier, click here.

Visuals may help.

I'm not familiar enough with the Nissan to give a good response, (although I do have my own gut feeling), so I'll just provide another log for the fire and let someone else toss it in!

[cmcdar]

I owned and Loved a Nissan Frontier it did pretty well towing my 3550 Dry weight camper BUT my Frontier was a manual transmission and the (****) clutch could not handle backing up the camper.

I did end up trading up to a Titan.

I do think that considering you live in a hilly area, I would not push the limits of the Frontier. You most likely will be able to pull the camper you may not enjoy tthe experience.

[MFL]

I think the floor plan makes a difference on tongue wt. If the axle is the same distance from the hitch ball. One trailers floor plan may put a few heavier appliances, further ahead of the axle. When loading the trailer, especially a single axle trailer, you can add or subtract tongue wt, by placement of goods/gear. You never want less than .10 for tongue wt, and yes .12-.13 would likely be better.

Figuring loading to full GVWR of 4,000 is worst case, so people use that to set a safety margin. I don't think you are looking at an unsafe tow, and a lot depends on the driver. Some folks can't handle being near a rigs limit, and the next may say it is great, while being well over the limit.

Jerry

[KillerIsMe]

I guess I just don't understand the trailer hitch weight thing. For example, I looked at two Sonic Lite models - one is the 168VRB with a dry trailer weight of 2950 and a dry hitch weight of 300. The other is the 169VBH with dry trailer weight of 2990 and dry hitch weight of 410. Both trailers have a GVWR of 4000 lbs. So the trailers are right close weight-wise, but the posted hitch weights are 110 lbs. apart. Now I realize you don't put stock in dry weights but they are there for general comparison purposes, and if you go by the conventional wisdom that says the hitch weight will be equal to the loaded trailer weight X 13% then the hitch weight will ultimately be the same for both trailers. So why the 110 lb. difference in the factory figures? I was using the hitch weight to get an approximation of my loaded hitch weight so I wouldn't exceed my vehicle's payload, but it appears I shouldn't have worried about that at all and instead just looked at GVWR and multiplied that by .13. What gives?

[KillerIsMe]

drsteve wrote:
Northeast PA is kinda hilly, isn't it?

Oh yes...very hilly. Our house is up a two mile hill no matter which direction we come from. Very hilly indeed.

[KillerIsMe]

drsteve wrote:
Northeast PA is kinda hilly, isn't it?

Oh yes...very hilly. Our house is up a two mile hill no matter which direction we come from. Very hilly indeed.

[KillerIsMe]

2012Coleman wrote:
I googled payload for your TV and got 1,052 to 1,267 lbs.

Gross weight for your chosen TT is 4000 so 4000 * 13% = 520

520 + 100 lbs for wdh setup is 620

Taking the high number, 1267 - 620 = 647 lbs for people, pets, cargo and full tank of gas.

I'd be interested in knowing the number from the door jamb sticker that states weight of cargo and occupants not to exceed xxxx lbs.

My number is 1218 lbs., and the little yellow handwritten sticker under that says to reduce that number by 192 lbs. So is that saying my payload total is about 1020 lbs.? Something I don't understand about the posted weight of a trailer: the Sonic is listed on the sticker on the trailer at 3200 lbs. dry, GVWR 4000 lbs., with a dry hitch weight of 290 lbs. (I typed 250 lbs. accidentally in my initial post). If I assume the tongue weight of the trailer will be 13% of the loaded weight - in this case 520 lbs. at 4000 GVWR - why are some trailers listed at 410 lbs. dry tongue weight and others at less (or more)? What does dry tongue weight have to do with anything if the tongue weight will always be 13% (approximately) of the max trailer weight? Why publish a tongue weight at all if it's always just loaded trailer X 13%?

[gmw_photos]

To the OP, expect any time now some folks are going to come along and try to rain on your parade here.
Most of them have probably never even driven a Frontier, let alone towed with one. I have a 2006 Frontier that I tow my funfinder 189FDS or my Titan two horse trailer with. Over 50,000 miles towing from sea level to the highest passes of Colorado. The truck works well, and is a good choice for these size trailers.

And before any of you try to tell me I don't what it's like to tow with what y'all are going to call an "adequate" tow vehicle.....my other tow vehicle is an F350 diesel dually that I use for my bigger trailers.

[GrandpaKip]

We have a 2008 Frontier and pull a 4500 to 5000 pound camper, depending on where we are going. Last year we went on an 8000 mile trip to the west coast. We were maxed out on payload but 1000 pounds under the gross trailer weight of 6000.
The Andersen hitch gets us within 1/2" of level front to back. The camper sits very close to level.
We have never had any sway problems with any of the 3 campers we've pulled with this truck. No problems going up or down any mountains. Yes, it will get up to 5000 rpm at times.
If you keep track of all your weights, the Frontier makes a very capable tow vehicle.

[donn0128]

Think about an RPod style trailer. A bit more areodynamic than the typical slab sided trailers.

[drsteve]

Northeast PA is kinda hilly, isn't it?

[2012Coleman]

I googled payload for your TV and got 1,052 to 1,267 lbs.

Gross weight for your chosen TT is 4000 so 4000 * 13% = 520

520 + 100 lbs for wdh setup is 620

Taking the high number, 1267 - 620 = 647 lbs for people, pets, cargo and full tank of gas.

I'd be interested in knowing the number from the door jamb sticker that states weight of cargo and occupants not to exceed xxxx lbs.