Soon to be New RVer

[Arduino]

Hello from Ontario! I've been reading the posts on this forum for a long time and appreciate the information provided by everyone (yes... I printed off the PDI list that I'll be making use of soon), and thought I'd open an account a bit early. After a couple of years of viewing and considering RVs, our family will be picking up our first ever RV in April - a 2025 Passport 229BH. Family has been camping on the ground for about a decade, and I personally have been camping, backpacking, etc. for 30+ years.

For your benefit and for those considering RVing, I've listed the main reasons why we picked the 229BH, in order of importance below. It looks like they made a lot of upgrades over the 2024 models that I would also consider more "premium" - and that helped (e.g. barrel ceiling with LED strip lights, porcelain toilet, cabinetry feels better). Anyways, here's the list:

1. Towable with 2018 RAM 1500 Diesel 3.0 - not going anywhere if I can't tow it
2. Dual Axle - I've towed trailers before, and a flat with a single axle trailer is not fun
3. Fiberglass exterior - maintenance reasons, resistance to water / critters
4. Fiberglass front cap - those bugs and birds pack a punch at driving speeds - ask anyone on a motorcycle
5. Still good length to use in most parks (under 27’) - would have liked shorter, but it was getting claustrophobic
6. Under $40K CDN +tx. (~$28K USD+tx) - managed to even get the WDH with sway bars within budget!
7. Bunkhouse floorplan for kids and space for dog below - versatile space that can be converted to storage / closet later
8. Dinette (and slide out) - designated space for games and eating, and for space.
9. Outside range and shower - rather cook outside and not stink up the RV, and the dog is a dog... sometimes a pig
10. Solar with 220W solar panel and 30A charge controller. - Looking to upgrade this, but love that it is wired for a 30A system
11. Inorganic floor (Hyper Deck) - No. 1 enemy for a building / RV is water. I hope the hyperdeck will serve us well.
12. Rooftop ladder - I wasn't going to carry more equipment than I need.
13. Build quality - No need to rank higher since there isn't anything significantly better in this price range, but looks good!
14. Queen Bed - Well, let's just say the wind isn't going to blow me away
15. New or near new - I'm handy enough to work through future problems. Hit on depreciation, but wife is happy.

Other RVs we were considering: Winnebago 2100BH 1900BH 2326MBBH, Bullet 2290BH (same as passport, but different colour). Bullets were nice, but colour scheme was a no go. Winnebago's were surprisingly poor quality - Every single one we saw, had something broken on it. Jayco's were too expensive and didn't see the value. Open Range didn't quite have the floor plans and seemed poorer quality.

Looking forward to RVing!

 

[workinonit]

You're not towing much with that 1/2 ton pickup. I don't know anything about the TTs you are looking at but I'm guessing they are too large for a 1500.

 

[DutchmenSport]

Welcome to the forums and congrats on getting your new camper. Getting "off the ground" is a new experience after living there for so long. My wife and I went from tents to a pop-up. We still had the outdoors airy feeling in the pop-up, which was great. After 6 years of that we got our first hard sided trailer and it took us about 2 years to over come that claustrophobic feeling. We missed the airy feeling. Fast forward 30 more years and 2 travel trailers and 1 fifth wheel later, and we'd never go back to a pop-up.

So, don't be surprised if you experience some mental adjustments between tenting and solid walls between you and nature. It does take a little mental adjustment. But it's ALL good!

Again, congrats and welcome!

 

[NH_Bulldog]

Welcome from New Hampshire and congratulations in advance!

I am not going to say this for any other reason than because I have personal experience. We towed our Passport 240BH with an F150 Super Crew which was well-equipped for towing. However, it was not an enjoyable towing experience and was in fact scary and exhausting, especially on longer trips. I had the 3.5L V6 twin turbo motor and pulling the camper was not an issue, but rather the weight of the camper and handling that made it almost impossible to have an enjoyable trip.

Here are some numbers to consider; the trailer GVWR is 7,600 lbs. (3,447 Kg.) Keystone publishes tongue weight based on the dry weight, which it is NEVER going to be at again, so you must use the tongue weight based on the loaded weight of the trailer (11-12% of the trailer GVWR), so that gives you a likely tongue weight of about 875 lbs. (mine was 925 lbs. at the scales). Add to this the weight of the weight distribution hitch (125 lbs.), plus driver, all passengers, pet(s), and bikes, fire wood maybe? and additional gear and you are looking at maybe another 800-900 lbs. All that puts you at right around 1,900 lbs. of cargo weight. Now look at the tire and loading sticker on the driver's door jamb of your truck and see what it says for weight of passengers and cargo not to exceed xxxx lbs./Kgs. As I had mentioned, my truck was specifically equipped for towing with a higher than normal cargo weight rating for a half ton truck. I would be VERY surprised if your truck had a rating over 1,900 lbs. (more likely in the 1,600 lb. range?). If you are in that 1,600 lb. range, that trailer is way too much for that truck (keep in mind that a diesel motor reduces available cargo capacity). Again, that truck will PULL the trailer with ease, but it cannot safely carry the associated weight.

I am not being an alarmist, just a realist. I have been there, done that, and hated every second of pulling our Passport with a half ton truck, as much as we tried to make it better, the only thing that solved our problems was a bigger truck.

Good luck, and please consider what I have written here. The decision is yours of course, but for the safety of your family and the traveling public, I urge you to do what's right.

 

[Arduino]

Thanks for the welcome and safety advice NH_Bulldog.

My RAM is spec'ed at 13,750LBs GCWR, and a max trailer weight set at 7,610 LBs, and max tongue 1,100LBs.

For the 229BH, spec'ed are as you said 7,600LBs GVWR total, dry weight is 5,600 LBs. I won't be towing loaded at 7,600LBs. I mean, each axle is rated at 3,500LBs - so, chances are, I will bust an axle at that weight before I can even begin to tow it, and that would still be well under the max trailer weight for the RAM. Hitch weight is 625Lbs Dry, and that still leaves room for LP and battery, etc.

 

[chuckster57]

Axles don’t carry the full weight of the trailer, the tongue has a portion, same thing for a fifth wheel and the King pin.

GCWR is a marketing ploy, heck a Tundra pulled a space shuttle. It’s how much weight you can carry on the truck.

Never say you won’t tow at max capacity, I said it for years until I had to drag full gray and black tanks from Nebraska to South Dakota.

 

[spicercars]

Welcome from northern MN.

 

[Grapehound]

Thanks for the welcome and safety advice NH_Bulldog.

My RAM is spec'ed at 13,750LBs GCWR, and a max trailer weight set at 7,610 LBs, and max tongue 1,100LBs.

For the 229BH, spec'ed are as you said 7,600LBs GVWR total, dry weight is 5,600 LBs. I won't be towing loaded at 7,600LBs. I mean, each axle is rated at 3,500LBs - so, chances are, I will bust an axle at that weight before I can even begin to tow it, and that would still be well under the max trailer weight for the RAM. Hitch weight is 625Lbs Dry, and that still leaves room for LP and battery, etc.

Arduino, welcome to the forum! I think you will have a lot of support and good information to consider from the members on here.

Please know that no one is telling you what to do, we're just sharing our experience with RV's with you.

We see a hundred times a year that someone chooses to tow a new travel trailer with the truck we've got. We all know new trucks are very expensive. They post on the forum and ask, "Here's my new rig; what do you think?"

As we look for the travel trailer we want, we all tend add this feature or that extra two feet of length or another slide, and our travel trailer gets longer and heavier until we buy one which we (mistakenly) ballpark at our truck's stated weight limits.

In fact, the vehicle sticker/brochure weights in the brochure or on your trailer's weight sticker don't even include a battery, your propane weight, wheel chocks or a pot of water for coffee in the fresh water holding tank. They don't include mama, or the kid, or the dog, or that lawn chair that grandma needs.

When you get your trailer loaded up for your first trip, please stop at a CAT scale and weigh your whole rig. I think you'll be quite surprised at the fact you are close to or likely overweight.

You'll see yourself how the trailer handles, how it stops at speed, how it handles strong crosswinds or even passing semis. As NH Bulldog suggests (and he knows) your driving experience with that rig may be less than pleasurable, if not borderline unsafe. You'll know when you head out across Kansas or up over a mountain pass and feel those 40 mph crosswinds for the first time. If your trailer handles great in these situations, then maybe you'll be fine with this configuration.

Your story happens 100 times a month on RV forums across the country. It's called human nature. People's trailer aspirations are always bigger than their truck's tow hitch.

What you choose to do about that is up to you, so you are completely free to ignore the Forum's advice.

But we would not be good friends to you -- people whom you can count on -- if we didn't share what our experience has taught us.

We are glad to have you in the forum!

 

[LHaven]

TL;DR: "tow rating" of a truck is eyewash, and suckers everybody. The first limit you will exceed will almost always be cargo rating (yellow door sticker) vs. your load of passengers, truck gear, and trailer tongue.

I recommend noodling with the towing calculator here, either the detailed or quick and dirty versions, to give you an idea of how your various loadings will interact and either cooperate or collide.

I ended up upgrading my truck after doing this -- it made a world of difference.

 

[chuckster57]

Real world numbers- yesterday a couple came to get their brand new tandem axle “Microlite” trailer. Iirc it is like 27 ft long and GVWR by the sticker on the sidewall is 7840.

They were asking about an Equalizer E4 hitch and asked what bars? Using the standard 10% you would think 1000 pound bars would be good. Since I have a set of tongue scales we weighed it with a single gp24 battery and 14 gal of propane. 1100 pounds on the scale so they are getting the 1200 bars.

All this to say- verify, verify, and verify.

 

[JRTJH]

Here's yet another attempt to "pile on without intending to be painful about it"....

None of us "know what we don't know" .... What does that means for towing a heavy travel trailer???

When we first pick up our trailer and drag it home that very first day, we get behind the wheel with NO PRIOR EXPERIENCE OR UNDERSTANDING of what the steering wheel will feel like, no idea how the trailer will push/pull the tow vehicle, no comprehension of how wide to turn so we don't hit the curb or worse yet, when turning left, sideswipe the car in the intersection, waiting to turn. We don't know how the rig will feel in sidewinds or what the "bow wave" of an approaching semi will do to our lane position and we almost always get surprised when a semi passes us (going in the same direction) and the trailer tries to move into the same lane with the truck. HOW DO WE CONTROL THAT ????

Then, how long does it take to stop the rig in an emergency? If a child darts out in front of us, can we stop before hitting the child? What if a car passes us, then suddenly slows down to exit the freeway? Do we swerve left to avoid that stupid driver? How do we visually clear the COMPLETE left lane so we don't cause an accident? Will the rig respond by tracking properly behind us in that kind of situation? Or, will the trailer, instead, "push the truck where it wants to go" ???

When that first tow occurs, for the OP, in April, he'll have no "background experience" in what to expect. Is his rig "responding like it should" or is it "really an accident waiting to happen" ??? He has no background on which to base a decision....

So, many "brand new RV owners simply conclude (or rationalize) that "this is how it's supposed to be, after all I've got a big box behind my truck, so this is how it must handle with this load".... MAYBE IT IS, MAYBE THE RIG IS COMPROMISED... How does a new owner make that determination????

For some, they simply say, "must always be like this" and they "white knuckle the steering wheel", fight the rig to stay in control, arrive at the end of the day, "DEAD DOG TIRED" and stressed, dreading doing the same thing tomorrow, but "that's the way trailers this big are supposed to tow"....

Then, fortunately (or unfortunately for some) they either give up and sell their trailer, something happens to their tow vehicle and they have to buy a newer/new one or for some other reason, they eventually hitch an adequate, properly matched tow vehicle to their trailer and IT BECOMES NIGHT AND DAY CLEAR that their old rig just wasn't performing the way it should.....

It's only "after they LEARN WHAT THEY DIDN'T KNOW" that the light bulb clicks on.....

There are hundreds of us, maybe thousands or millions of us that have experienced this "light bulb moment".... It's from that vantage of "knowing what the OP doesn't yet know" that most of this advice comes from.... We've all "been there, done that"... Many have the T-shirt, hat or sticker on our trailer to attest to what we learned that we didn't know.... It's that information that most are attempting to share, we understand how a rig "should tow" and the pitfalls that cause bad towing in marginally matched tow vehicles with large, heavy trailers. We are attempting to impart that "abstract information" in a few words on an internet page....

OP, there's no malice in what's being posted, only attempts to help you "know what you don't yet know"...

 

[Clegg]

Welcome to the RV life! (minus all the doom and gloom..) I hope you enjoy the new RV, and make sure you get them to throw in the collapsible trash can!

 

[440scout]

Those Ecodiesel trucks can get 34 mpg highway unloaded and mid teens mpg towing a 5000 pound camper. From what I've read most of the mechanical problems have been eliminated from model year 2020 and newer. We don't know what your trucks Payload Capacity is yet but hopefully its enough so things work out for you. Good luck!

 

[Arduino]

Thank you everyone for your feedback and comments. All is good!