Thank you, everyone. Lots of good information in here -- and lots of conflicting information as well. :)
It may simply take picking my trailer, loading it up with gear, food, clothes, etc., and taking it out for a shake-down trip -- and just giving it a shot without WD. Our shake-down would be within 60miles from home...and have some interestate between here and there. Should show me very quickly how the setup handles.
My current 5th wheel is about 11,250lbs fully loaded for a trip. With our setup, that puts me at over 2,000lbs of pin weight. The F-250 lacks that extra leaf that the 350 has, but I went with it because of insurance reasons which, at the time of purchase, would have forced the 1-ton truck into a commercial policy at an extra $900 insurance per year -- but that's a whole other topic.
The scales show my truck at roughly 5,000 lbs on the front axle and 3,500 on the rear -- but that's with my 300lb 5th wheel hitch setup in the back and my family of 4 in the truck -- so reality is about 3,000 over the rear axle.
I get about 2" of squat when I load my fiver...and use the air bags to level the truck back out. I could always add the extra leaf or better yet, go with a SuperSpring setup to maintain ride quality without towing, and should prety well eliminate squat with a small TT.
The truck is a monster -- and way overkill for the small TTs that I'm looking at. I have an E-rated setup for wheels and tires -- and the gross alxe weight rating is well over 6,000 lbs. I would run out of payload long before I ran out of what the rear of the truck can handle. But...I've never hooked anything up to the bumper of this truck save for a small trailer with a motorcycle -- and of course the truck just laughed at that load. :) So I really have zero point of reference here wrt TTs...but know lots about the fiver setups. :)
Thanks again.
