Towing questions?

My parents are wanting to sell their old camper since they never use it. It’s a 2002 Springdale 215fdl with a dry weight of 3686lbs. I would almost exclusively use this for hunting season meaning it would be winterized so I wouldn’t be carrying any fluids except propane. My guess is after I have all my hunting stuff and food loaded the gross weight of the trailer is ~4200-4400 pounds. I would most likely have only myself and 1-2 other buddies in the truck and they are all pretty slender built 170 ish pounds.

my parents are willing to sell it to me for pretty cheap I’m wondering how the taco will do towing it because it’s a good deal. I’ve read some things on here that 4500 is about the max you want to go but others say they wouldn’t even touch 3500 just want a good opinion because it’s a tough deal to pass up.

 

it all comes down to what you're comfortable with.

 

~4500# with a trailer brakes is as much as I would do. Starting in first even up slight hills with MT is no fun. On an AT I think 5k with a WD hitch would be no problem.

Im gonna tow ~4K pounds through mountain passes for 500 miles this weekend, will be a good test. Single axle 6x12 enclosed. My truck is not stock and I also will have weight in the back of truck.

 

Your truck won't be happy about it, but it will do it. Since it's your parents, hook it up and take it for a test drive and get a feel for it. Worst that could happen is you say no thanks.

 

I've shared my experience with towing. I'll do so again here.

My wife and I bought this 2022 Coleman Rubicon 20' trailer. Single axle, supposed dry weight is #3800. In August 2022, we towed it from northern California to eastern Kentucky, mostly on highway 40. My truck got 17 - 18 MPG before that trip. I averaged 9 MPG towing that trailer. It had maybe 300 pounds of clothes, dishes, food in it. Most of that 2400 mile trip I spent in 4th and 5th gear. Never made it to 6th, not even once. Got down to 3rd plenty of times going over the many mountains out west.

Initially, I was thinking that even at maybe 4100-4200 #'s, it was just too much for my truck. But after posting this same trip report here, someone suggested it was much more likely the wind resistance of the trailer, as it is very tall. I agree that is most likely the main MPG killer for my truck. more so than this trailer's weight.

These pics were taken at our place back in CA the day after we bought the trailer.

 

Thanks for all the feedback guys. I really appreciate it. Some other things to note my parents live quite aways away so everytime I see them I usually fly. If I was to make the trip driving I’d like to know for sure if I was gonna buy it or not.

another thing is the specs have the dry weight listed as 3686# but I’ve seen a ton of newer campers online that are shorter that boast the same or heavier dry weight. It just seems unrealistic to me that a shorter newer camper would be heavier especially on a single axle when the one I’m looking at is a double axle. I’ve always been a wall tent for hunting season guy but having a heated real bed to sleep in during the October Wyoming weather would be a god send.

As far as trailer brake controllers go I’ve seen a lot of people use wireless and others won’t touch them. which direction is the one to go I don’t want to skip on something like that.

 

i honestly don't understand the appeal of a wireless brake controller.

you still need to plug into the truck, the truck supports a brake controller add-on with a simple single harness under the dash that will then automatically make the oem 7pin connector have a brake output to the trailer. there's nothing saved time-wise doing a wired setup, and there's zero interference, or syncing issues to ever need to deal with that a wireless system might never experience, but is inherently capable of experiencing being that it relies on radio frequency for communication.

 

I have to agree. Wireless is not the convenience that they are making it out to be.

I'm also old school, I want that handbrake within close reach. There have been times when my trailer wanted to slide into a rut, and a quick squeeze on the controller lever was what got it back on track. Can't really do that with a phone app.

 

It's your parents, why not hook it up and try it out? If you decide against it, let me know and if they give me the same price I will take it off their hands.

 

My old travel trailer was pretty much the same weight. I pulled it a few times with my Tacoma and had no problems at that weight. But that is about as much as I'd want, and it might have been too much in mountains and at altitudes over 5000'. I have an F150 which pulled it much better, so I didn't use the Tacoma much. But would have done so if it had been my only truck.

My only concern is maxing out your payload. You + 2 buddies @ 170 lbs each is 510 lbs. The tongue weight of a 4000 lb trailer is going to be 520 lbs. That may well be over your payload.

But it should be easy to take it for a test drive since your parents own it. It might not be the best choice for a cross country road trip. But for shorter, occasional trips I think you can make it work.

 

My experience here ... https://www.tacomaworld.com/threads...4-700lb-travel-trailer….760812/#post-27122598

Just about to set off on a 5k mile round trip on Sunday to the East coast, I averaged 11.5mpg last year over 8k miles but those miles were all done West of Denver with lots of mountains, this trip I should get even better mpg as there's no mountains. Current combined weight is 10klbs.

With the rig you're talking about you will likely run out of payload in the truck before maxing out any of the other limits, especially with other passengers. Put all cargo in the TT over the axle. My recommendation is to use the redarc brake controller and Anderson wdh with sway built in.

Photo at Wolf Creek pass 10,800 ft elevation.