fractal
Gold Member
A couple of things that may help you zone in your requirements.
How many people do you need to transport when you are towing? Is you and a passenger enough? Will you be transporting children? Will you want to transport a crew of adults. The extended cab trucks with the baby back seat are not bad for kids but murder on adults. A modern standard cab is required to have air bag disable on the passenger seat so you can transport children in the front seat.
How important is tight quarters manuverability? A short bed half ton will get into just about anywhere that a car will. I can not get my long bed crew cab through many drive throughs. I have to park quite a ways away from any store and take up two parking spaces. Manuvering in tight driveways is impossible.
Do you own the trailer(s) yet? The reason I ask is that gooseneck trailers are supposed to be a LOT easier to manuver, but their pin weight is often greater than a ball hitch's ball weight. 20% of 8000 pounds is 1600 pounds which is right at the limit of what you can put on the pin of a 3/4 ton gooseneck. I am no expert but don't know of many ball hitches rated at 1600 pound ball weight.
A larger truck means you will be pushed around a lot less which means better control. A larger truck means less manuverability in town and higher fuel costs.
I went from a s10 to a f350 long bed crew cab. I am thinking that for my needs a better solution would have been a short bed pickup with a goosneck trailer. Would make the truck easier to drive and would have greater cargo capacity.
Think carefully before you pick up extras like diesel motor, 4wd, crew cab.. All F350's have very similar (within a hundred pounds) GVWR. 9900 pounds in my case, a 1991 model. A standard bed, standard cab with gas motor has a 9900 GVWR on a 6000 pound curb weight truck. That's close to 2 tons of cargo capacity. A long bed, crew cab, 4wd diesel F350 weighs in at 7500 curb weight.
Finally, as has been said. The extra coolers on transmission and engine oil are not optional. I would not consider oversize brakes optional either.
How many people do you need to transport when you are towing? Is you and a passenger enough? Will you be transporting children? Will you want to transport a crew of adults. The extended cab trucks with the baby back seat are not bad for kids but murder on adults. A modern standard cab is required to have air bag disable on the passenger seat so you can transport children in the front seat.
How important is tight quarters manuverability? A short bed half ton will get into just about anywhere that a car will. I can not get my long bed crew cab through many drive throughs. I have to park quite a ways away from any store and take up two parking spaces. Manuvering in tight driveways is impossible.
Do you own the trailer(s) yet? The reason I ask is that gooseneck trailers are supposed to be a LOT easier to manuver, but their pin weight is often greater than a ball hitch's ball weight. 20% of 8000 pounds is 1600 pounds which is right at the limit of what you can put on the pin of a 3/4 ton gooseneck. I am no expert but don't know of many ball hitches rated at 1600 pound ball weight.
A larger truck means you will be pushed around a lot less which means better control. A larger truck means less manuverability in town and higher fuel costs.
I went from a s10 to a f350 long bed crew cab. I am thinking that for my needs a better solution would have been a short bed pickup with a goosneck trailer. Would make the truck easier to drive and would have greater cargo capacity.
Think carefully before you pick up extras like diesel motor, 4wd, crew cab.. All F350's have very similar (within a hundred pounds) GVWR. 9900 pounds in my case, a 1991 model. A standard bed, standard cab with gas motor has a 9900 GVWR on a 6000 pound curb weight truck. That's close to 2 tons of cargo capacity. A long bed, crew cab, 4wd diesel F350 weighs in at 7500 curb weight.
Finally, as has been said. The extra coolers on transmission and engine oil are not optional. I would not consider oversize brakes optional either.
