Seeking Advice for Towing RV Travel Trailer with 2022 Tundra Platinum…

Regarding the below specs on my Tundra 3rd Gen and the RV Travel Trailer I am considering… What are the recommendations from experienced RV Towing guru’s that know what not to do and vice versa. Any advice on this size trailer? It seems to fit the spec’s and capacity for something payload (including tongue weight)? It’s just my wife and I (avg size folks), but real world driving experience with something this size I have not done yet.

2022 Toyota Tundra Platinum 4x4

w/-leveling Rear Height Control Air Suspension, Adaptive Variable Suspension (AVS) & Vehicle Stability Control

Manual/Model: VXKA75L-PSUZZA

GCWR: 17250 lbs

GVWR: 7285 lbs (GAWR Front: 4080.lbs / Rear: 3860 lbs)

• Max Payload: 1310 lbs
• Dry Weight: 5975 lbs

Max Payload: 1310 lbs *

Actual Towing Capacity: 9965 lbs (GCWR - GVWR) *

RV Travel Trailer Considering:

• Brinkley Model I 265
• Auto stabilization.
• Length: 29’ 11” / Height 11’ 3”
• GVWR: 9600 lbs *
• • GVW: 7298 lbs (Dry Weight)
  • Payload: 2302 lbs *
• Tongue / Hitch Weight: 659 lbs *

 

Sounds like you have things well in hand.
You'll never really know until you take it out on the road.

 

Thx, but any experience in towing something similar? Looking for any feedback to consider in addition to just the #’s.

 

I've towed things with my Tacoma that were supposedly beyond its ability.
Added the Never Sway and it towed just fine you just had to leave a safe distance between the car in front of you.
Have you taken it out on the road yet?

 

I have not. Just started looking and rationalizing getting a RV (1st one). Thought we’d start with a travel trailer. So driving with added weight there is a strategic approach to various things like distance and space between me and whatever else is on the road. what about wind, traffic congestion, turns, etc? Given the length, weight added? I think i have plenty of payload in both the trailer and the truck including tongue weight? But i am sure that also sneaks up on you. Side note… I’ll utilize sway bars even though there is auto stablization, thoughts?

 

Personally, it's more weight than I would want behind a half ton. If it is more than just you and a partner, you're going to run out of payload, but also likely rear axle weight rating. A good place to start would be to load the tow vehicle up with all gear, occupants, full tank of gas, and including the hitch if possible. Then drive it through CATscales to get and idea of what you really have available for towing.

Pretend your traveling very light in both the tow vehicle and trailer. So, if only you and 1 other traveler combined for 300lbs and the hitch at 60ish pounds that leaves you 950lbs of Payload. Traveling very light in your TT, that is 7300lbs bone dry, let's say you come in at only 700 lbs of all gear and fluids in the TT. You theoretically need to have 10-15% of the trailer weight on the hitch, you're coming in at 800lbs to 1200 pounds of hitch weight.

Let's assume you can safely come in at 800lbs(10%), well that leaves you with only 150lbs (950-800)to spare. So you're under payload, but here are the problems.

1. You're probably going to have more in the truck than just you and 1 other person.
2. You're probably going to be beyond 8k lbs in the trailer that's dry at 7300lbs.
3. That's a larger trailer for a half ton and will likely need to be packed forward for stability and avoiding the "tail wagging the dog". This means more like 12% (960lbs) than 10% of hitch weight.
4. Towing doesn't happen in a vacuum. TTs have high profiles and wind resistance(subsequently decreasing Tow Vehicle performance) that is vastly different than with the same weight in a low profile cargo trailer.
5. Toyota lightened the GRAWR on these truck so much. They're on par with the competition for non towing packages, but not with the competitors' "tow packages" that offer additional cooling and higher rear axle weight ratings.

A properly loaded TT, distributing 10-15% of trailer weight to the hitch, and about 7500 to 8k lbs GVWR in the trailer would be an upper limit for me based on specs of any newer half ton.

 

After considering a used Class A we settled on a new 21 Tundra and a 23' travel trailer. With about 1/3 of my 42,000 miles towing the 6,000 GVWR trailer I'd say I could tow something longer and heavier but don't think the trip would be as relaxing as it is. Putting 580 a day through Nashville, Louisville, Cincinnati and Columbus tax me more than I'd like.

 

Thanks @szabo101 ! This is what i was looking for. I’ll have to reread it thought a lot to unpack.

My logic might have been flawed here…. I assumed the following:
1) Tongue weight was spec’d at 660 lbs. Assumption: It would give me 750 lbs for payload - wife, myself, small dog, hitch/swaybars and maybe few other items?
2) TT payload was 2300 lbs (TT dry was 7300). Assumption: I’d have available payload for distributing travel stuff/gear in the trailer?

Sounds like in order to have balance / distribution (no tail wagging?), I’d need to move payload content forward thus affecting the tongue weight? Also wind is an issue or could be? And finally how does the axle weight come into play?

@szabo101 - What size truck might you recommend? If was was to upgrade for towing? I know… it’s cheaper to keep the truck and go smaller TT

Thankx

 

- So the driving experience is affected such as wind and pull etc? What exactly was taxing? Traffic, spacing, wind elements, maneuvering? So it sounds like the experience to prep for is more than just numbers, it’s’ also ease of towing and travel experience?

 

I think @szabo101 is pretty dead on.

I've towed a fair amount, and I paid my bills for several years towing and hauling. Given my experience I'd say that setup is about 7 feet longer and rated for about 3000 lbs more than I would touch with a half ton. I don't enjoy driving at the limits.

My general rule for safe and comfortable towing is that I try to stay under 80% of any ratings. The Tundra gets a slight exception because of it's sub par payload. I'll go closer to max payload on them, but I still avoid the max tow ratings. Really hate towing anything much over 22-23 feet outside of a heavy duty truck. It's just a lot of wind forces and sway for a light duty 1/2 ton, IMO.

 

Thanks for sharing the expertise! Very helpful.

 

It's a tough call.
Do you plan on taking extremely long trips?
If you're going to be on the road a lot you definitely dont want to pull something with white knuckles the whole time.
In my case I'm only pulling a Lance Model 1995 which weighs in at around 4500 lbs empty. With all our gear and water it's about 5500 lbs.
Don't even know it's there for the most part.
Dont need anything bigger since it's just the Wife and I and maybe our two Boxers.

 

Very good idea! I think ill try that.

 

Thanks @Tundra Texan

 

As you attach the trailer to the hitch, all weight will go to the rear axle, and at the same time unload the front axle, think of the rear axle as the fulcrum between the TT and the front axle. A Weight Distribution Hitch (WDH) will transfer some weight back to the front axle, the goal of the WDH is to restore the original weight to the front axle. Getting all weight back on the front axle can be challenging, but you should try to restore as much as you can for stability. An example from my 2018 from the CAT scales would be as follows:

Total Weight Loaded, but no trailer 6540
Front Axle 3760
Rear Axle 2780

Total Weight with Trailer hitched 13140
Front Axle 3560
Rear Axle 3760
Tailer Axle 5820

My Trailer added 780 lbs of it's weight to the Truck.
(3760+2780) - (3560+3760) =780
Hitch Wt/(Hitch Wt +Trailer Axle) = Hitch Weight %
780/(780+5820) = 11.8%

So with the WDH, I was able to get my front axle to within 200lbs of it's original weight. But even with the WDH, look at the total weight on my rear axle (3760), it's within 100lbs of your GRAWR. So, at 8k or 9k lbs, you can easily exceed the rear axle wight rating.

BTW, my weights when l hitched put me 120 lbs over payload of 7200 lbs.

My next truck will likely be a 3/4 ton gasser. I tow my travel trailer about 10k per year, but also use my truck as my daily driver. I like the idea of the diesel for towing, but because I use it for short daily trips, 15 minutes to and from work, the gasser seems to make more sense.

 

Great info, I mean great learning here! I followed the math . So similar, my truck is my daily driver about 25mi to and then from. So I would also consider staying with the gas engine. when you say 3/4 ton are you referring to the HD’s? Ford super duty, Chevy 2500HD, etc…. What would router. Would you go if you went with the 3/4?

 

There are so many here with more experience than myself when it comes to the HD trucks.

If I'm not mistaken the Ford 7.3 and GM 6.6 both came out about 5 years ago and have seen some growing pains for both, but I think they are getting better. The Ram 6.4 Hemi has been available for a while now and I think has less bugs than it did. It'd be a tough call, both Ram and Ford can be held with larger fuel tanks, about 50 gallons in crew max, long bed configs. Less frequent stops are a big deal when towing.