Travel trailer hard to handle 2019 Ford F150

[Rock Crawler]

29 responses and Morris is silent. This seems to be a trend... Get responses that a new member doesn't like so the new member silently backs away from the thread.

I hope that Morris returns to respond to the 29 ignored posts on this thread.

 

[morris lipham]

Sorry I haven稚 responded, my computer died. My SIL will get a bigger truck. The people at the camper place convinced him that his truck would pull the camper, probably would told him that if he was driving a Volkswagen. They bought a bigger camper to live in while they build a new house.

 

[morris lipham]

My SIL has a friend that has a F250 that they will hook up and try first to see how it performs.

 

[Rock Crawler]

Sorry I haven稚 responded, my computer died. My SIL will get a bigger truck. The people at the camper place convinced him that his truck would pull the camper, probably would told him that if he was driving a Volkswagen. They bought a bigger camper to live in while they build a new house.

When I had my 2017 Ram Rebel 1500 and went to buy my 28 ft Coachmen Apex, they asked what I had to tow with and I pointed outside... They said "your good to go!"....

That truck had a 1075 lb payload and 9,600 lb tow rating. I hooked up with no WDH or sway control and drove away.

A short time later, I almost died trying to pull 8,000 lbs so I added the Equal-Izer and it did great at getting rid of sway induced death.

But the air suspension and payload issue meant that the truck not only was grossly over payload, but this particular truck knew it and disabled the auto level air suspension, locked up the system and I had to pull the battery cables to reset it every time I pulled the camper.

A short time later I bought a Ram 2500 with 14,400 towing and 2,900 payload. All better now.

So that $26,000 camper ended up costing me $26,000 + $59,000 + $800 just to get it and haul it safely.

 

[morris lipham]

Some of these camper salesmen have probably got some people killed

 

[Deere Dude]

Some of these camper salesmen have probably got some people killed

Just for kicks I asked a camper dealer if my 93 GMC 6.5 litre dually would pull my new 16,000# 5th wheel camper. He said no problem.
I know for a fact it could hardly pull a 9-10k# camper at highway speeds so after he said that I take everything they say with a grain of salt if they are selling you something.

 

[hawkeye08]

TW (tongue weight) should be 12-15% (go to scales and get real weights for truck and trailer). Lots of other contributors as noted above.. but tongue weight is a key. Many 1/2 ton trucks have tow capacity, but when tongue weight is correct, it puts the truck over the payload #s...

Propride and Hensley will likely stop the sway, but shouldn't be needed with proper setup..

 

[shooterdon]

My SIL has a friend that has a F250 that they will hook up and try first to see how it performs.

That is a very smart thing to do.

One other option. If they will be living in it while building their home, have the trailer pulled by someone with the right equipment and park it there. It makes little sense to invest in trailering something that big unless it is a necessity. If your SIL wants to rationalize getting a newer and larger PU, that is fine too, but I bet money is tight...it was for me when I was starting out. Putting $10-15K into his home will be a wiser investment than upgrading his truck.

 

[morris lipham]

Possibly a Hensley Hitch or a ProPride Hitch. I have the propride and it stopped all sway on my 30' 12,600 GWR toyhauler.
Disclaimer: It worked for me, your results may vary.

I sent him a text to check into the Propride hitch

 

[morris lipham]

That is a very smart thing to do.

One other option. If they will be living in it while building their home, have the trailer pulled by someone with the right equipment and park it there. It makes little sense to invest in trailering something that big unless it is a necessity. If your SIL wants to rationalize gettiTng a newer and larger PU, that is fine too, but I bet money is tight...it was for me when I was starting out. Putting $10-15K into his home will be a wiser investment than upgrading his truck.

They won't be building the house for 2-3 years when he retires. they will be using camper every 1-2 months. Still don't need to throw good money after bad .