Quote:
Originally Posted by flybouy
Agree with what John has stated. I think we all become complacent with the things we use regularly. Somewhere I heard that "Electricity can kill you" but I use it all the time without issue. All big box stores sell light switches and receptacles so it must be safe for me to replace it. Never mind that I've never held a screwdriver, have no idea what those "switches" in the box labeled "electrical distribution panel" are for.
Somewhere I heard that mixing ammonia and bleach together may be a problem but hay, if one cleans well then why not mix it and use both to clean better right? You'll be making chloramine gas that can destroy your lungs and even be deadly.
Trucks I believe fall into this category. We use them every day and are just amazed at what they haul compared to that car or crossover you had before. Just look how big that thing is! Someone buys a 1/2 ton truck and pulls a pop up and they "feel" like they are king of the road and can pull a mountain in their "great bis truck". They get or want a larger trailer and move up to a 3/4 ton and "vroom" vroom" joining the "big boy's" and get a diesel. NOW your in the major leagues and the salesman tells you "you can pull anything on the lot" and the misunderstanding/lack of information is perpetuated.
You believe the salesman after all he's the "expert" right? You WANT to believe him because you want the big shiney new camper right? Asking an RV salesman what you can tow is like walking into Best Buy and asking a salesman what the best tv is. He's going to tell you the one you want is the 80" whatever that they have the most of in the backroom that the sales manger said "we have to move these out the door by Friday" during the pre open meeting. Never mind you'll be setting 5 feet away go blind trying to watch it.
So why do we end up at the weight discussion? Because we care. That's right, we've been in the situation, we know the pitfalls, and we have absolutely no motivation other than that. It's asked in a respectful way because we don't know if you know or not. You stated "probably overweight" so obviously you suspect but you don'r KNOW.
It's the type of people most of us here are. We like to help, relay our learnings and experience. I'll try and explain it this way. If I walk outside and my neighbor is working on his car and asks me if I know how to replace the front struts. I look and see that he has the car jacked up on the little scissors jack that he found in the trunk. I also note that he doesn't have the wheels chocked in any manner. On the ground he's got a screwdriver and a pair of slip joint pliers and a hammer. Do I tell him, yes, remove the top and bottom bolts and walk away thinking to myself "he's going to kill himself" because I don't want to challenge his sensibilities? Sorry, I'm not that kind of person.
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To take the highlighted above and another example;
Back in the 50s we lived in a small plant camp. My dad had a friend that liked to work on his car - a Buick if I recall (parents had a Olds Rocket 88). One day the neighbor was working on his car and dad and I went over to see what was going on. He had the car jacked up with an old bumper jack, a wheel pulled off and he was under the car. Dad questioned the jack and if he didn't need to put something else under there and he said it was fine. I decided to go outside the garage and play. In a few minutes I heard a crash and dad yelled "Arch, Arch"!! I went inside and dad was trying to move that car and he told me to get out. The car had fallen off the jack and crushed Arch's head. In later years I wondered if dad had just been a little more insistent on shoring that thing up if Arch would have been spared, but dad wasn't that kind of guy.
Basically when the topic of weights is brought up it's to prevent something like the above; the person saying everything is "OK", "just fine" then that fluke moment happens and the thing we already saw/knew comes back to haunt the "OK", "just fine" person. Instead of just saying "OK" like my dad I prefer to make sure, beyond a shadow of a doubt, that an individual in fact understands the potential consequences of their actions.