Postby eluwak » Mon Sep 17, 2012 9:07 am
Everyone has a different safety limit in mind.
About the trailers first:
The rental Jayco we had was between between 5300-5600 lbs during the tow. I estimate the tongue weight to have been closer to 700 lbs or so, but because the trailer was a little high in the front it might have been a little more.
The North Trail should hover around 5600 lbs during tow for what we intend to do for the first year (local weekend camping). Tongue weight is already too low so I will need to rebalance the loading to make sure that we place what stays in the trailer more forward.
About my Path:
GVWR: 6000 lbs (sticker)
Curb: ~4500 lbs (Nissan website)
People/stuff: <600 lbs (I put gear in the trailer)
Remaining payload: ~900 lbs
I'm fairly certain that 700 lbs tongue weight isn't a problem, but it would be nice to know what the real differences between a 2WD V6 and 2WD VE are chassis wise. It won't push the Path over the GVWR though. I would like to weigh the setup though if I can on the trip to get real numbers.
I have some towing experience from campers before as I grew up learning to drive tow vehicles. The Jayco was far from ideal in my book, but the Path handled it no problems. I was extremely apprehensive at first because we used to tow a 25 ft camper with an Aerostar, and it used to get pushed around quite a bit. If anything the physical size of the units worry me more than the weight itself. The 450 miles through hills & small mountains with that Jayco behind me proved to me that the vehicle could handle the weight.
I won't know how well the new unit pulls until I hook it up. We will be using a much better WDH/Sway system than with the Jayco, and it will be properly setup this time. The new unit is a hare under 2 ft longer, lower to the ground, and has wider axle spacing. It could be a dream or a nightmare. If the latter then we will leave the trailer there and come back with a different tow vehicle, but I am fairly confident that it will work out fine. My trip to pick it up will have about 550 miles with the trailer in tow, but will be staying in the town of the dealer that night so we can tow it around and check it out before we head home.
Some will say that I shouldn't tow more than a jet ski, others will say straight up to 6000 lbs. I say you have to take that info into account and judge for yourself adding in your abilities and comforts. The 80% rule is probably good to go by as a starting point though, I'll be closer to 95% on this.