TomHaycraft
05-05-2015, 01:24 AM
While a bit of humor in that subject line, I am wondering.
Knowing I was just under my rear GAWR and at 90% of GCWR towing the Springdale with my ’09 Silverado C1500, I had been saving for a bigger truck. My sights were set on about four more years, to have cash necessary to purchase the next truck around 2019. My fatal mistake was setting up a search in CarMax with e-mail notifications when ¾ or 1-ton trucks with diesels came available within a 300 mi radius of me. This was fine for almost 4 months, by description and cost, nothing piqued my interest. That all changed Friday.
2013 3500HD Duramax/Allison, crew cab, long wheelbase, 2WD, single rear wheels, 41,000 miles. All things I liked (pleasant color as well). Price was very tempting. Needless to say, Saturday morning I made the 3 hour drive to Garland, TX to check out the truck and see what they would offer for my ’09. Offer was acceptable, “out of pocket” over what we had saved, can be covered in a couple months, got wife’s blessing, decision and transaction complete in 3 hours, drove back south with it. Not much needs to be said about qualities of the 3500HD. With a trailer weight of only 7,700 lbs (45% of tow capacity) and 1,240 lb pin weight (30% of published cargo capacity), the truck shouldn’t break much of a sweat with this combo! Someday we’ll buy a bigger trailer, certainly won’t have limitations (we don’t plan on full timing) and getting into state and national parks is an important factor.
Prior owner had pulled a 5th wheel, took bedrails with him, will be easy for me to drop in new ones (already ordered from eTrailer.com). Challenge is higher bed height, 5+ inches higher than the C1500. I made up 3” moving pinbox to top, 5th wheel hitch had already been in lowest position. I was already a touch nose high in prior configuration since I could not mount the pinbox (Reese Sidewinder) higher and still allow the arm to swing. With LWB, no longer need pivot of the Sidewinder and have pinned it and removed the wedge.
Until I get the hitch secured in the bed, I can’t move the truck/trailer to level ground. With plywood in bed and hitch on it, I was able to set king pin into place, sag of truck was between ½ and ¾ inch. Clearance over bed rail hard to make sense of as pavement slopes down from covered storage. Because of angle, gap is from 6” to 3”. Once on level ground, I will likely need to raise hitch a bit, will have to see how high nose of trailer is and whether too much weight will be shifted to rear axle. Time to mod frame of trailer and lift? Leaf springs already on top of axles.
One last niggling thing … with LWB, I can’t back all the way to pinbox without closing tailgate. Suggestions on brands of notched (V) tailgates?
Once I can move the rig, I’ll send additional pictures with measurements.
New name for the rig might be “Odd Couple!”
https://picasaweb.google.com/104227046946836220021/2015052013Silverado?authuser=0&feat=directlink
Knowing I was just under my rear GAWR and at 90% of GCWR towing the Springdale with my ’09 Silverado C1500, I had been saving for a bigger truck. My sights were set on about four more years, to have cash necessary to purchase the next truck around 2019. My fatal mistake was setting up a search in CarMax with e-mail notifications when ¾ or 1-ton trucks with diesels came available within a 300 mi radius of me. This was fine for almost 4 months, by description and cost, nothing piqued my interest. That all changed Friday.
2013 3500HD Duramax/Allison, crew cab, long wheelbase, 2WD, single rear wheels, 41,000 miles. All things I liked (pleasant color as well). Price was very tempting. Needless to say, Saturday morning I made the 3 hour drive to Garland, TX to check out the truck and see what they would offer for my ’09. Offer was acceptable, “out of pocket” over what we had saved, can be covered in a couple months, got wife’s blessing, decision and transaction complete in 3 hours, drove back south with it. Not much needs to be said about qualities of the 3500HD. With a trailer weight of only 7,700 lbs (45% of tow capacity) and 1,240 lb pin weight (30% of published cargo capacity), the truck shouldn’t break much of a sweat with this combo! Someday we’ll buy a bigger trailer, certainly won’t have limitations (we don’t plan on full timing) and getting into state and national parks is an important factor.
Prior owner had pulled a 5th wheel, took bedrails with him, will be easy for me to drop in new ones (already ordered from eTrailer.com). Challenge is higher bed height, 5+ inches higher than the C1500. I made up 3” moving pinbox to top, 5th wheel hitch had already been in lowest position. I was already a touch nose high in prior configuration since I could not mount the pinbox (Reese Sidewinder) higher and still allow the arm to swing. With LWB, no longer need pivot of the Sidewinder and have pinned it and removed the wedge.
Until I get the hitch secured in the bed, I can’t move the truck/trailer to level ground. With plywood in bed and hitch on it, I was able to set king pin into place, sag of truck was between ½ and ¾ inch. Clearance over bed rail hard to make sense of as pavement slopes down from covered storage. Because of angle, gap is from 6” to 3”. Once on level ground, I will likely need to raise hitch a bit, will have to see how high nose of trailer is and whether too much weight will be shifted to rear axle. Time to mod frame of trailer and lift? Leaf springs already on top of axles.
One last niggling thing … with LWB, I can’t back all the way to pinbox without closing tailgate. Suggestions on brands of notched (V) tailgates?
Once I can move the rig, I’ll send additional pictures with measurements.
New name for the rig might be “Odd Couple!”
https://picasaweb.google.com/104227046946836220021/2015052013Silverado?authuser=0&feat=directlink