Grit dog
Black Diamond, WA
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Good to see ya Kayteg!!
2016 Ram 2500, MotorOps.ca EFIlive tuned, 5” turbo back, 6" lift on 37s
2017 Heartland Torque T29 - Sold.
Couple of Arctic Fox TCs - Sold
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Grit dog
Black Diamond, WA
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Groover wrote:Grit dog wrote:Another good point. No one knows how his rear suspension was set up. But one thing is certain, that camper won’t haul on that truck without something else besides the stock springs.
Unless you are bottoming out the suspension going with stiffer springs adds stress to the frame. The suspension is there to absorb the bumps. Making it stiffer reduces that capability.
Agreed for the most part. And bottoming out stresses the frame right over the rear axle. Been there done that got the T shirt! (To be fair I’m the guy that welded the frame back together when I was in high school, I would have been smart enough to not put a 7klb skid steer along with a spade attachment in an approximately 2000lb dump bed with a 20klb tag trailer loaded sitting on the factory 2” receiver!). Even before I knew as much about vehicles I could do basic math and my eye sight was pretty good! Lol
However excessive cycling of the suspension also puts stress on components. Typically minor elastic deflections that after xxx,xxx number of cycles work hardens steel and leads to brittle fractures. (At least that’s what I learned in mechanics of materials and metallurgy courses after I saw it happen in the real world).
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Grit dog
Black Diamond, WA
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mkirsch wrote:I find this whole thread hilarious. This forum has been dedicated to beating down "weight police" for years... "You don't need to worry about weight! GVWR is meaningless! It's a DUALLY! The AAM axle is rated for 11,000lbs! Just add up your tire capacities, slap in a set of airbags, and GO! If the tires don't add up to enough, get 19.5's! Nobody that's anybody pays attention to weight! It'll be fine!"
Now all of a sudden everybody's a weight police. "Oh he was 10lbs over GVWR! That's why his frame broke!"
Lol, you’re kinda right! Although to be fair I’ve generally been in the camp of srw trucks chassis can handle about what duallies can save for tires wheels and springs. Therefore they are under rated and no issue overloading to an extent. But if 1 ton Dooleys were under rated the same then they’d look like their class 4 and 5 cousins and those trucks wouldn’t have the much stouter chassis that they do have.
But in this guys case he was waaaay over the 14k gvw number which is still a very safe number for that truck. And he likely wasn’t over the real axle or tire/wheel rating. No flat tires and bent axles in that pic. Just a taco’d frame. Which even someone like him got 25k miles out of…..
He’s the reason that ratings exist, because not enough working material between the ears to know when he was pressing his luck.
That setup was likely around a full ton over the gvwr. Or 2 tons over a srw or 3 tons over a srw 2500. All with the same basic chassis.
See now why I’m not worried about 4000lbs in the back of a 2500 hurting the truck itself?
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notsobigjoe
southeast
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Joined: 09/15/2016
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Bedlam wrote:Some of the camper weight ratings I have seen assume a 150 lb person in every seat. If you have six seating, that reduces your camper carrying rating by 900 lbs.
Chevy does it this way. I have a dually crew cab with 3 seats front and back, that's 900 pounds. This is probably the best thread I've read and participated In on this forum. The weight police pros and cons be darned, truck camping takes some thought to be realistically safe on and off the road. As we all see the price is really something. JMHO
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jimh406
Western MT
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mkirsch wrote:Eh, no. I've tried pointing out parameters and telling people to decide for themselves, only to get beat down by the "The numbers are meaningless, just haul whatever you want! It's a DUALLY!" crowd. So much so that I've pretty much joined them.
I agree that some people think DRWs are invincible. Personally, I pointed out that there are probably just as many DRWs that are over GVWR as SRWs, or for that matter, all RVs.
I know many Class A owners never even think about being overloaded or checking their tire pressure. Amazing what you can learn talking to other RVers at campgrounds. ![[emoticon]](https://forums.goodsamclub.com/sharedcontent/cfb/images/grin.gif "grin")
'10 Ford F-450, 6.4, 4.30, 4x4, 14,500 GVWR, '06 Host Rainer 950 DS, Torklift Talon tiedowns, Glow Steps, and Fastguns. Bilstein 4600s, Firestone Bags, Toyo M655 Gs, Curt front hitch, Energy Suspension bump stops.
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Kayteg1
California > Nevada
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jimh406 wrote:
I know many Class A owners never even think about being overloaded or checking their tire pressure. Amazing what you can learn talking to other RVers at campgrounds.
I hope the manufacturers improved the designs, but over decade ago it was famous issue where ClassA were blowing the tires sitting in the garage. Few people actually check and the rigs left the builder with 3-400 lb cargo capacity.
That include people
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JimK-NY
NY
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Take a look at specs on trailers. The weight problem is major for many models. Axles, suspension components, frame and tires are often so undersized that the units can barely handle carrying a few hundred pounds.
Most manufacturers and dealers just try to avoid the issue. At least the Eagle Cap truck camper brochures warn buyers it is their responsibility to be sure their truck has sufficient capacity and the loading follows proper COG requirements.
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valhalla360
No paticular place.
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jimh406 wrote:Groover wrote:40 years ago many of the truck campers I saw had shock absorbers on the front of the cabover going down to the front fenders. The point of these was to absorb the frame damaging stresses that lead to fatigue and also control a bouncy ride.
If you read what Lance says about their shocks, they were to improve the ride. They made no claim that they helped with frame stress.
In any case, anything you can do to soften bumps/ride is probably good. When I bought my truck used, one particular bump on I-90 was pretty brutal. I installed Bilstein shocks and that bump wasn't very noticeable after that. I don't know how the stock shocks performed when new because I didn't own it then.
It's possible that the suspension added to the stresses on the frame. You can easily watch how much your TC moves when you hit bumps. Big movements compared to the same road without a TC are probably not a great thing.
While we are on suspension, I feel the right amount of air in airbags can also smooth out the ride, but nothing will smooth a very bumpy road other than slowing down.
Shock absorbers by their nature should help.
Force = mass * acceleration.
Properly designed shock absorbers to the overhang would spread acceleration of the overhang bending down out over a longer distance and thus time by starting to resist the downward motion sooner. If it takes twice as long to stop the downward motion, the acceleration and thus force would be cut in half.
On a similar note, it's common for people to upgrade to stiffer tires, springs, airbags, etc... In moderation and within the trucks weight limits, this is usually not a problem. But if the owner put on really stiff tires running at max psi and pumped airbags to max to compensate for being overloaded, that can dramatically increase the forces applied to the frame. Rather than the tires and suspension absorbing a big bump gradually by compressing, they transmit it quickly (ie: greater acceleration and thus force) to the frame.
Tammy & Mike
Ford F250 V10
2021 Gray Wolf
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mkirsch
Rochester, NY
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JimK-NY wrote:mkirsch wrote:
Now all of a sudden everybody's a weight police. "Oh he was 10lbs over GVWR! That's why his frame broke!"
Did you notice the post from someone with the same truck? CCC is 4738#. The owner of the broken truck had a camper with a base weight of 5000#. Water and propane bring that to 5500#. Accessories are not included. We can see solar, awnings and a roof rack. I can't see if there is an A/C unit or a generator neither are in the base weight. At a minimum the weight will be 6000#. That does not include the bikes or rack, tools, kitchen gear, food, bedding, air compressor and personal items very likely totally well over 1000#. Best guess is this unit was in the range of 7000-7500# or roughly 2500-3000# over the CCC. In addition there is clearly an issue with center of gravity.
Sadly beginners and often experienced truck camper users often fail to realize how heavy their rigs are.
"Conventional wisdom" on this forum is, NONE OF THAT MATTERS! Axle's rated for 11K! Nobody's ever broken a frame!
Telling someone they needed a 4500-5500 class truck to carry a camper like that got you ostracized as a worry wart, weight police, fun-hating SQUARE.
This thread just oozes with HYPOCRISY.
Putting 10-ply tires on half ton trucks since aught-four.
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Grit dog
Black Diamond, WA
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This thread is Better than a comedy show! And the old Lance front shocks aren’t even remotely a solution or even a help , fwiw.
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