Towing 6,000 with a 6,500 towing limit safe?

I am planning on purchasing a trailer with a weight on 6035 and a dry hitch weight on 620. I know that my 2008 Toyota Tacoma 4x4 Trd Sport V6 with the towing package has a max towing of 6500 and a max hitch weight of 650. Do do you think this trailer is too much? I will not be loading it's tanks so there will not be that extra weight, but is this trailer too much for my taco?

 

Safe, yes. But you won't be able to load much in the trailer or truck(4 adults would prob exceed your payload) as you are already near the limit.

 

Five grown men and a camper shell with a cooler in it is quite literally our payload with these trucks. It's a joke. That being said, I wouldn't hesitate to tow that trailer. Make sure you have a weight distribution hitch, a good brake controller and don't drive like a dick.

 

I wouldn't do it, get a bigger truck or a smaller trailer.

There's a difference between "it will get it from A to B if it has to" and "it will comfortably tow it". You absolutely will be bust your max GVWR / towing when you load up with camping gear and people.

Might find yourself not using the trailer as much as you would/should because you are worried about the towing portion of the trip. Much better to have a lighter trailer or a bigger truck and have the towing be worry free.

 

I would tend to agree... there are lots of really nice 4500lb trailers out there that wouldn't be near the hassle to tow. I've been eyeballing the starcraft 17xth for a few years down the road.

 

Look at livin lite aluminum trailers.

 

East coast towing experience here & I have no problems 10,780# rolling down the road. Yea I know I'm at the max on tow,payload,hitch but these trucks do great! Enough stated here in the Carolina's "Coachmen Apex 250RLS "

 

I would almost bet you would be over your GAWR. These pickups can pull 6500 pounds just fine (with zero hitch weight). You will hit your GAW well before you hit your max tow. See one of my earlier post: https://www.tacomaworld.com/threads/show-off-your-cat-scale-results.428963/. You may be able to get away with only yourself and no cargo in your TV, but as soon as you add passengers and a bag of chips, it's very easy to max out the GCWR.

 

There is a safety margin built into tow ratings, so safe/doable, yep. But trailers are pretty much always over their advertised dry weights to start, and it takes almost nothing to add a few hundred pounds. And towing at max weight is never fun.

 

Thank-you all for the help. I will have to continue my research then and try to find a trailer that is just as large but lighter so that I can comfortably drive it a long distance.

 

Does any one know if placing all gear in the back of the trailer lower the dry hitch weight?

 

A trailer is a lever, wheels are the fulcrum. Put enough weight at the backand you can have negative on the hitch. That's unsafe for everone involved. No matter how you improperly load a trailer bad things can happen.

You want 10% of the loaded trailer weight on the tongue for proper handling.

'Dry' weight on a trailer basically means completely unloaded, nothing but its own weight.

 

I have a 21' tt that weighs 4100lbs dry and it's to much for the truck. It's fine on flat road with no wind. But it seams like every time I pull it there's 20 mph winds and everything here is constant hills. The truck struggles and gets 6 mpg. Now I use one of my dads trucks every time I tow just because it's not good on the truck.

 

On our way home from a 4 wheelin' trip yesterday, we were witness to a wreck involving a Ford F 150 towing a boat. It was about a 24'er on a decent trailer, but below the Ford's towing capacity by a bit. And then someone changed lanes and cut him off.....After just a slight swerve, he jack-knifed, went over a guard rail, flipped and destroyed truck and boat, and left in a medical helicopter......In a PANIC situation, load capacities fly right out the window. You need stability, braking, and control far beyond a "normal towing situation". Speaking as someone who's got hundreds of thousands of miles of towing 25' gooseneck trailers behind 3/4-ton and 1-ton pick ups, it isn't the best situation to tow right up to your weight capacity. 99% of the time you get away with it......But that other 1% can be a real bitch....If you're going to push the limits, be ready for what MIGHT happen.

 

6 mpgs. Wow. That is straining the truck.

 

Heavy load on the back of a trailer will make the trailer wag like a dog's tail.....You do NOT want that, ESPECIALLY with a light truck. Load weight OVER or just slightly forward of trailer axles. You want AT LEAST 10% of the trailers weight on the hitch.....more if the truck can handle it.

 

And it doesn't have to sway on you but once, and it's all over !

I made that mistake one time (negative tongue weight). Won't happen again. I was very lucky. As I crossed the ditch, and as the trailer was in the process of turning itself (and my truck) OVER, thank goodness, the coupler broke, and freed the trailer from the truck. One of the trailer's wheels, actually broke off the axle, as the trailer swayed hard to one side, just prior to me losing control and crossing the ditch. At that point, I was only along for the ride. I was up on two wheels twice, just prior to breaking free. Again, I was very lucky, as the ditch that I crossed, was on the left side of the road, and the two-lane road was nearly bumper to bumper, with Friday afternoon traffic. How I got through all that, without hitting anyone, and without turning over, I'll never know. Yes, the trailer was a complete wreck, and ended up turning over, just clear of the right rear corner of the truck, but never touching it. Only the hitch on the truck was bent, but the main thing, I was okay (at least nothing a fresh pair of boxers couldn't take care of).

 

Hello all-- I am looking at buying a tt to live out of for a few years and wouldn't plan on towing it that often. Maybe a few times a year to a different site locally or, maybe once or twice a year on longer trips. That being said, I am looking at getting the most trailer I can get and am digging a few of the Kodiak Express TTs that are showing to be about 4800-5500lbs (average shipping weight) and wonder if this would be okay with my Tacoma if not doing it regularly. Any advice or guidance here would be greatly appreciated. I am looking at adding the Reese WD system with Sway control and the Prodigy Brake controller. Anything else?

 

If you have water, waste water, gear, and supplies on board I think you're going to be close to max towing capacity.

 

When I pick a vehicle to own, I ask myself this question: Will it COMFORTABLY manage what I need it to do 95% of the time, and CAN it do what I need it to do 99.9% of the time?

In other words, its ok to push the limits occasionally, but dragging around something uncomfortable a lot of the time, is unacceptable.

If I was going to REGULARLY pull around something at or over the vehicle's limits (and I'm talking real limits, not marketing limits), then I'd have to consider something bigger.


Here is the thing; you can SAFELY pull around 10,000 pounds with a moped with a custom gearbox. It becomes a question of WHERE you are pulling it, and how you are doing it. For example, it would not be safe to pull 10,000 pounds down a 10% grade with a moped and no trailer brakes -- you would probably die. But if you are pulling it around in a perfectly flat and empty parking lot with nobody around, then you'll be fine. The reality is that you can't ask a question like "will it be safe?" because whether or not it is safe depends on YOU, not your equipment. What you can ask is "will it be comfortable?" or "will it be legal?" (the law generalizes everything with hard limits since it is not possible to categorize "safe" on an individual basis) or "am I out of my mind?"

In Europe, trailer towing has a speed limit in most places of 80 kph. Towing weight limits are considerably higher than they are here, and tongue weight % is lower there (5% instead of 10%). At higher speeds, you need to move more weight to the front in order to maintain stability. So you certainly CAN safely move 6000-ish pounds here, or even more, like 10,000, if you keep the weight off the tongue and the speed low.

At a 5% tongue weight, 650 pounds tongue weight means 13,000 pounds of total trailer. But it'll sway like all heck if you get it going at a typical north american highway speed limit, and you might die. Keep the speed at europe speeds though, and it'll do the work just fine. Having said that, it is probably not LEGAL in most places.