New to towing a Travel Trailer

[88Racing]

I do have to agree with 408F150 super springs concept.

They do help to stabilize and not make the axle compress as much.

I have them on my work truck and it makes driving it through the unfinished terrain at job sites more enjoyable in the 11000 lb truck I drive. I have been running them for 2 years now and no complaints. Even pulling a 24' job trailer is more pleasurable with them on the truck. But unfortunately I don't use a WD hitch at work.

Lars

[TXWolf]

Well, I now have the new stabilizer springs installed on my truck. They're rated for 3000 lbs. I took the truck over to the RV storage to get a visual ... to see if they hold up to the task at hand. Here are a few pics:

Truck and 36', 7330 lb travel trailer:



Back tire without the full weight of the trailer:



Back tire with the full weight of the trailer:



Front tire with the full weight of the trailer:



The rear of the truck isn't dropping NEARLY as far as it did without the helper springs ... but is it still dropping too far? What do you guys think? I didn't take it out for a quick trip around the block because we had to be somewhere else soon. I'll do that sometime this weekend.


On another note ... we took my brothers 21' boat for a trip down to the Gulf Coast last weekend. For the most part, I couldn't even tell that the boat was back there. We drove part of the way using the 87 Performance Custom Tune, and the 2nd half of the trip in Custom Towing Tune. I could definitely tell that I had more power/responsiveness using the Custom Towing Tune. The temps stayed in respectable levels, although I mostly drove on the highways, without much stop-and-go traffic. My gas mileage took a dump (averaging around 8.8 mpg), which makes me start to cringe when I think of how bad the mileage will be with the heavy travel trailer behind the truck. LOL

[gabeyd]

Did you get a picture of the front without the trailer?

It should go down when your trailer is hooked up if your WD hitch is setup correctly. If it stays the same, or goes up, then you need to put more torque on the WD hitch, which would also bring the rear up a bit, as it transfers weight to the front.

Looks good though, nice truck, and nice trailer!

I tow a 32' Cougar with a 2000 Excursion:

[Kwattro]

Nice set-up TX. I recently bought a 31ft Gulf Stream at 6750lbs dry, and currently pulling over 8000+lbs loaded up with our stuff and people. Below the 9200lbs rated capacity for my truck and below the gross combined rating too. Tows GREAT. I have a Reese weight distro hitch and get 1" to 1.5" sag in the back maximum. Essentially instead of the truck having a slight rake unladen, it sits level with the trailer attached. Handles the weight just fine as far as steering and braking but it's a turd on the hills even with the Edge installed. So I'm on the hunt for a supercharger! Our salesman gave us a funny look when I told him we'll pull with an F-150 but I showed him the worked out numbers and even fully loaded with a person in each seat and more gear than needed I still had very good headroom under the GCVW. I love everything about it, just need power to get up the loooooong hills. Happy RVing TX!

[04FX4]

If you are going to traveling up any larger hills, get a larger tranny cooler.

[Jackpine]

Originally Posted by 04FX4

If you are going to traveling up any larger hills, get a larger tranny cooler.

X2! I'm getting pretty high temps just from pulling 3600# up high mountain passes (or 5-6 mile 7% uphill grades on the interstates).

- Jack