Who Tows with a Cab-over Camper?

[WestTN]

towing with camper and trailer

I have a Sportsmen 8 foot camper with full facilities and a 29 foot travel trailer. I have towed and carried these for thousands of miles with my first Dodge diesel (1989) and my current 2001. I have had zero problems with either stability, stopping, fuel economy or wind. I say go for it.

 

[TBontrager]

Looks like more people favor the torklift over the reese titan for "extended" towing. Anyone know of a mail-order outlet to order torklift superhitches?



Also, I currently have an '01 and may move to a new truck in 2 years (or so). Will the entire investment in a torklift be lost? or does the "stinger" portion of the hitch mate up to any superhitch installation?



Thanks!



Tim

 

[Demon Dodge]

With the new camper my old hitch extension wasn't long enough. Due to time constraints I bought a Torklift. I think my old hitch was more stable. I am going to modify the tork lift and see if that helps. The chains on the torklift kept getting loose and the turnbuckles were poor quality considering the price of the hitch.

I averaged 12MPG with the camper and trailer from home to Santa Rosa NM. towing at 60mph in Ca and 75mph as soon as I crossed the border. Hills and grades don't even slow it down.

 

[dan brooks]

I have a Palomino pop-up style camper that has a stove, fridge, furnace, and outside shower. With a porta-potty and a Cabela's shower shelter it has all the comforts of home, and less weight and wind resistance of a hard side camper. You can get the Palmino and similar pop-ups with inside showers and toilets, too.



The truck and camper combined is about 7700 lbs, and with the Jeep on the trailer I'm sitting just under 14k pounds total. I'm running Firestone air bags and they made a huge difference in how the truck handles with the camper. Summit Racing had the best price when I bought mine.



This pic was taken last month: (EDIT: I averaged a hair over 12 MPG on this trip. )

 

[Houser]

Houser here

If you are planning to pull 7k with an extended hitch you will need to get some towing wiskers or upgrade to a class V hitch. I was towing a 6K toy hauler with a 3" extended hitch and broke my stock class 3 off at the mounting bolt brackets. The oem hitched are not as tough as they look.



good luck

 

[DPelletier]

I haul my Bigfoot 25C9. 5 (3217 lbs wet and loaded) and tow my Wells Cargo toy hauler (6300 lbs) and until last year I did it with my '01. 5 2500 QC LWB and would provide the following comments;



- You are going to be way over GVWR, so be smart about it. Keep the camper weight as low as possible. This means no basements, no slides, etc. I would suggest a lightweight 8. 5' camper with bathroom. In addition you are going to have at least 1,000 lbs tongue weight, so if you can tow without a hitch extension, you will be much happier. Anything over 8. 5' long will require a hitch extension and a change to a "class V" hitch.



- don't go by the manufacturer's listed dry weight. They lie.



- Use weight distributing bars.



- Prep the truck for the load. Airbags will help keep things level, but sway control will be your primary issue. Load range E tires aired to 80psi are the way to go. Consider a set of Rancho 9000's set on level 9 for the rear. Personally, I went with a custom set of 5 leaf overloads for better sway control, but then I wasn't concerned about a harsher partially loaded ride.



With my camper and trailer, my truck was at approx. 11,500 lbs GVWR and with the above set-up it worked alright. I went on a trip from B. C. to halfway down Baja and experienced everything from 75mph highway drives to some fairly brutal gravel roads in Mexico. Ultimately I decided that 11,500 lbs was too much for my 2500 and I bought my DRW. The stability of the stock dually is far superior to the moddified SRW truck. I strongly suggest you try to keep your loaded camper weight under 2500 lbs, which means a dry camper weight of no more than 2000 lbs.



Hope this helps,



Dave

 

[GEM]

Am I reading this correctly? You have a full size drop in and pull a 29 ft TT at the same time?