Quote:
Originally Posted by kcordell57
And I'll interject 2 thoughts on this(as I may be in the same type situation, but won't acknowledge due to the "weight police").
From a reputable RV magazine:
1. There is NO SUCH THING as a 1/2 ton towable 5th wheel, despite what a given auto or RV manufacturer tells you.
2. Half of ALL 5th wheels on the road are overweight somewhere.
After hashing weight #'s myself for the last 9 months and talks with many people, including auto engineers that I know, I believe the 2nd point to be true. Seems everybody doesn't care about GVWR, just payload when the GVWR is the more important #.
And to start another arguement, from one of the auto engineers that told me that the weight #'s have lots of 'fudge factor' built into them, a way to calculate a truer GVWR, with your weight ticket subtract the empty RAW from 'hooked up' RAW and add to your GVW. That # is a real world GVWR.
Example:
RAW with camper 6340
RAWR - 3460
= 2880
GVW(truck ready to hook up to camper) + 8560
Real world GVWR 11440
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Couple of things;
First, please enlighten us with which auto manufacturer these "engineers" work for so we can avoid those products....he's just wrong and doing a disservice to you and anyone he tells that garbage to.
Secondly, I don't think most folks knowingly disregard GVWR or payload (the interaction between the 2 has been explained by xrated). I do believe however there are untold numbers of folks that buy mismatched truck/RV combos out of ignorance. Some ask around and find they are overloaded and try to fix it; some find they are overloaded and try to rationalize it to themselves (in their minds) and to others; then there are those that just don't care (hell! It's got a 1000lbs. of torque, it can pull anything!). The ones in the first group take the appropriate, safe path to address the situation.
As far as your "engineer's" explanation of "fudge factor". Yes, it is there. Your gawr's will be more than your gvw. As has been explained that is THE fudge factor put in by the manufacturers because they know people cannot and will not abide by the published numbers....so they make some room for "those" people. Anyone that then believes the gawr numbers are where they need to stop....oh, but a few hundred more lbs. won't matter; well, what can you say? Bottom line is that the numbers are the numbers. When the manufacturer say for each of them: MUST not exceed; DO NOT exceed - that's what they mean and I'm sure the jury of your choice would point that out.