What The Truck

I know, I’m a guy so I should know a little about trucks. The key words here is “ a little”. I had always been a car kind of guy. I have had a few vans in my day. One van I used for work and my second van I used mainly for camping and to carry my dogs on trips.
My wife and I are now looking for a truck. We’ve tried pulling our trailer with a 2002 Dodge Ram 1500 and a 2003 GMC Envoy, both of these could pull it but they struggle up hills. At first we thought ”let’s trade the travel trailer in for a smaller one that our Envoy can pull. Then we thought “ let’s get a truck big enough to pull the trailer”. We finally decided that since we plan to spend a great deal of time in the trailer, we should get a light weight but roomy trailer and a truck big enough to pull it with ease. Easy to decide but totally confusing to do.
First we had to figure out the weight of the trailer. We have a Coachman Captiva, it weights 5300 pounds empty and is 28 feet long. It has a good bit of space inside if you are camping a week or two, but to spend months in it,.. hmm I don’t know. We found a 2014 Forest River Salem Travel Trailer, that with the bump out living room space, would be easy to live in long term. Its overall length is 33 feet and it weighs 6,355 pounds empty. Mayo loves the floor plan and the rear end kitchen space. I’m a bit concerned about campsite availability for a trailer this size, but we both love it. Mayo and I both agreed that we would stay with something similar to this size and weight,.. or smaller.
After you figure out the weight of the trailer, you must then add the weight of all the things you will load in it. You must also add the weight of your propane tanks, fresh water tank, gray water tanks, and batteries. This is the total weight of your trailer. Since our Salem trailer maximum cargo weight is 1,327 lbs our total weight should never exceed 7,682 pounds.
This means we now need to find a truck that can pull at its very least 7,700 pounds. But wait, there’s more,..lol. We’ll need to add the weight of all passengers and any cargo in the truck, to the weight of the trailer. This will give us the total weight that the truck must be able to pull with ease…
Well before breakfast I weigh about 189 lbs, Mayo’s about 110 dripping wet with rocks in her pockets, so that’s another 299 lbs. Our canoe, which we will never leave home without, weighs 80 pounds. So I’m thinking we now need a truck that can pull at least 8,100 and that’s if we never put anything or anyone else in it.
Here’s the tricky part. Finding a truck salesman that will tell you the truth about what their trucks can pull or the gas mileage of any f-250 or 2500 truck. If you go to a Ford dealer they will tell you every truck on their lot can pull that weight. It’s the same at the Chevy dealership , Dodge dealership or a used car dealership. They will all tell you this and this may very well be the truth. On a clear sunny day when the breezy is prefect and the ground is completely flat for miles in every direction, any truck can pull this weight. But I’m looking for a truck that can pull this weight plus up hill in all direction through the snow and rain, (although I never plan to tow in the snow or rain), and yet gets good gas mileage. Am I asking too much,.. ahh,.. maybe?
Well when I can’t get the answers from the dealerships, I go to my one true source of information,… Mayo. As always, the Google gypsy queen researched until we were sure of what truck to get for the job of pulling our trailer. The 2015 GMC Sierra 1500 double cab truck, with a 5.3liter Ecotec3 V8 engine and a 26 gallon gas tank. Its towing capacity with a 3.42 rear axle is 9,600 pounds, but I’m looking for the 3.73 rear axles because its towing capacity leaps to11,200 pounds. They both get 16 miles per gallon city and 22 highway.
As I see it now, We have the right truck and the perfect trailer for our journey all we need now is some small miracle to enable us to afford them. Oh well,.. if nothing else I know more about trucks now.