Anyone pull a gooseneck trailer with their F150?

I have a 2022 with 3.5 EB. Bed is the 5.5'. From what I can tell it is 3.31 ratio.

I have been pulling a 16ft bumper pull stock trailer with cows from time to time. Looking at possibly getting a gooseneck, but not sure if I will see improvement or not.

 

Some info here on 14th gen forum:

https://www.f150gen14.com/forum/thre...lability.2287/

 

Here’s some good guidance for you.

Nice to see yours is working for a living

https://www.ford.com/cmslibs/content...o_r4_Mar30.pdf

 

Not sure what "improvement" you're looking for, but I can assure you that you'll love the maneuverability (forward and especially backing), on-road ride-comfort, total absence of potential for sway, and ease if hitching compared to a similar capacity bumper pull. IME the consistent. confident, and relaxed 'tracking' of a gooseneck / 5th wheel just cannot be beat.

Both of the F150's described in my signature block below have the B&W Turnoverball gooseneck hitch installed since new. I used the 2005 to tow a true-gooseneck utility trailer for 15 years hauling baled-hay and tractors / implements. Absolutely loved it compared to a similar capacity bumper pull trailer.

I use the 2022 to tow a 21ft 5th wheel RV using an Andersen hitch mounted to the B&W Turnoverball, again I love the rig. Note that's a 3.5EB with 3:55 axle; IMO with your 3.5EB and the 10-speed tranny the 3.31 axle should be just fine (check the Ford Towing Guide for your rated maximum gooseneck weight rating).

Whenever I have a choice between towing a gooseneck/5th wheel or a bumper pull trailer I will always go for the former.

And yes, I'm a huge fan of the B&W Turnoverball gooseneck hitch specifically.

EDIT - regarding your 5.5ft bed, if you get a true gooseneck stock trailer with a tapered / triangle-shaped front frame to the gooseneck post, you'll have zero cab-clearance issues and be able to back that into a very tight turn; if you get a trailer with a full-width front (like an enclosed storage area or platform over the truck bed), depending on its width you'll need to be attentive to cab clearance / conflict on very tight turns. The short bed would certainly not deter me from making the change from bumper-pull to gooseneck.

 

Payload will probably be a concern. Goosenecks tend to get pin heavy. But if when all is said and done it is within capacity, then its definitely my preferred hook up.

I have never hauled a stock trailer before. But all the livestock trailers I have seen have the axles pretty far back. So that tongue weight has to be 20%. So even a 7k trailer will probably exceed capacity of most F150s.

 

Most guidance suggests 15% minimum weight on the pin for a gooseneck; for a 7k GTWR trailer that'd be 1050#; add ~150# for the truck's gooseneck hitch assembly = 1200# of 'payload'.

Yeah, that might exceed your truck's rated payload. Consider that when shopping for and loading the trailer. More likely than not if you've been pulling a loaded 16' bumper pull stock trailer, you'll find a gooseneck with similar capacity will be fine.

 

15% minimum for gooseneck equipment trailers empty. Livestock goosenecks put way more pin weight.

Livestock gooseneck's are HD territory.

 

We just traded our '17 Plat 3.5 for '21 XLT PowerBoost. We have the max tow package.
We are looking at a 2-horse or stock trailer to fit our livestock. We are back and forth between bumper and gooseneck.

I know you run out of payload before you run out of towing rating. With a 1538lbs of payload (if I remember that correctly), are we basically screwed? I think it doesn't include occupants, so I'm pushing over 250#, with the wife and I in the truck we are about 400lbs. With that hitch, we're already at 1,600lbs of payload in a typical empty stock trailer?
Or am I getting the numbers wrong?

The trailer would be smaller for probably 2-3 horses max, but only ever having 1 animal in, between 700-1400lbs. The reason we are looking at stock trailers is we have a camel. She doesn't fit in typical 2-horse trailers as lot of them have that vertical bar in the middle that gets in he way.

 

If you go easy on loading the truck (hopefully that's possible) I think you'd probably still be ok with bumper pull... but gooseneck requires a lot more payload than bumper, and you don't have that.

 

You're saying "probably ok with bumper pull." The truck is rated at over 10k lbs, obviously not to max it out, but even with a 7k heavy trailer, I'm looking at about 700lbs on tongue and like 400-600lbs of cargo, so should be plenty of room. Or am I missing something?
I know I'm flinging around lot of assumptions.

Would you have any information on what a typical gooseneck has for tongue weight?
I'm guessing about 7k lbs gooseneck would have 1200# on the tongue with a 1,000 animal, which would give us 338 inside, so basically wife and I...