Drmoman

We have been going back-and-forth on whether to purchase the 2015 or 2016, F150 ecoburst since the tow rating is now 12,000+lbs or having to spend the extra money on a F250, which I really don't want to do. I was ok with it until I started reading about CHP and other law enforcement agenices either citing or tow F150s due to overweight issues.

Can anyone out there tell me about this and how I figure out if the 5th wheel (haven't purchased it yet) will be ok in weight with the F150? I planned on purchesing one between 8,000 & 9,000 lbs.

BRUTE448

model number?? youll need regaurdless, max tow and max payload options of which ford hasnt put out yet.

Steve Osborne

max tow is out and the hd as well.....


max tow has dropped to a 3.55 axle from 3.73 and hd is in the option lists...
sure the max tow will help tow the load with the coolers/larger...and the hd package will give more payload...no longer 7 stud wheels.....yeah


just remember the higher the option/model/package....less payload.....i'm happy with my xtr- I didn't want leather in an fx4...

BRUTE448

thank u. and I stand corrected!!

Trailbreak74

Can you elaborate on the CHP towing or citing F150's for being overweight? Where did you hear of this? How do they determine if your truck is over weight?

Personally I think a fifth wheel trailer calls for an HD truck. It's not that much more expensive, and if you need the towing capacity, just get the HD.

On the other hand, a half ton truck can tow a lot these days. I have no problems towing 6000 pounds with my 2014 F150.

11screw50

While I agree with this, I saw half a dozen 5th wheels that had been towed in by F150's (oddly, I think mine was the only F150 that was not towing a 5th wheel). Only one of the F150's had the dumbo mirrors.

I think there are a LOT of people towing over payload. (but I knew this based on what I see every friday out my office windows all summer...half tons pulling 35ft TT's usually at 75-80mph up the highway...)

And that said, I cannot recall hearing about anyone being stopped or fined for being over weight.

13Raptor

It's not so much the Leo's that caused me to buy a SD this time, but the worry that my insurance might not cover me in an accident if I was overweight on the payload.

xcntrk

This question comes up a lot in the RV forums and really has nothing to do with the vehicle manufactures published tow/payload ratings and is more focused on the registered tonnage/weight for the truck in the state of origin. For example in my state of VA, cars and light pickup trucks all have common “car” tags with a maximum GVWR of 7500#. For the majority of F150’s this is sufficient as it exceeds any of the maximum GVWR packages available from Ford (with the exception of some of the HD payload trucks w/8k gvwr). So in VA, anything above 7500# moves to a “truck” tag which is then registered at 1k lb increments for both GVWR and GCWR. As the registered owner, you have the ability to specify what you want those maximums to be, although most follow the manufacture specifications. Keep in mind these weighted truck tags are far more expensive in licensing costs, tax, and annual renewals then your common car tag. Mostly because the state thinks you’re running a business with a weighted tag and penalizes you for the extra weight/load on state roads.

What’s really tricky and varies from state to state is how a truck + trailer is weighed and then matched against the registration. Some states (for non-commercial applications) weight just the truck then match that against the GVWR registered for the tag (like VA). So the weight of your truck, plus occupants and gear in the bed, plus the weight incurred from the tongue/pin, would equal the total GVWR that would then get matched against your registered GVWR.

Other states get real funky with this measurement with some pulling the trailer maximum GVWR, combined with the weight of the truck, and comparing that to the registered GCWR! Where this will bite you is for an empty or partially loaded equipment trailer. In these states, you have to register the GCWR maximum to be greater then the max GVWR of the trailers you pull. Example: an F150 is pulling an empty 20’ tandem equipment trailer. The HD trailer probably weighs 5k lbs totally empty and is well within the specs for the F150 towing it. However, the maximum GVWR of the HD trailer is probably 20k lbs so in some states they take that 20k + the truck weight (7k) and the registered GCWR must be greater than 27k! And when it’s not, it’s hundreds of dollars of penalty for every 1k lbs over!!! Crazy..

As for exceeding the actual manufacture tow ratings, never a good idea, but there’s no real weight police out there watching for this, only the registered weight violations I mention above. The only time I could imagine this would come into play is in some criminal or civil law suit. Heaven forbid you’re in an accident while towing that involves a loss of life. It wouldn’t be a stretch for a negligence charge to be brought against you for having a 15k lb fifth-wheel pulled by an F150. It would be pretty easy to prove the overweight violation, however proving that was a factor would be a whole other situation..

Trailbreak74

OP,

I'd still like to know where you heard the CHP is towing F150's for having an overweight trailer.

Two things I know are true.

Truck salesmen will always try to convince you that the truck they are selling you can tow "anything".

RV salesmen will always try to convince you that your truck, no matter what truck you have, can tow the RV they want to sell you.

Havyek

Don't believe these guys, you can tow anything with anything!