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  1. #1
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    First Time Owner Help

    I’ll be a first time buyer. Looking at Transcend 245RL. Any thoughts. My wife and I. Also I have 2019 Ford F-150 2.7 Eco boost with 355 gears. Is that enough truck or should I upgrade to F250 V-8
    Looking forward to suggestions.

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    I think you'll find that the 2.7EB with 3.55 in combination with the 245RL may not be adequate. It would help to know what the GVWR on the door sticker of the truck is.

    That camper is UVW(no propane, batteries, or anything else) 6,237 pounds with a gross of 7,695. The absolute most according to ford your truck could pull is 7,700 but in the real world that number is high when looking at the weight of the truck with all passengers and other cargo.

    I don't see anyway of making the numbers work out for that combo, as much as I hate to say it.
    Last edited by shaggybob; 07-21-2021 at 01:28 PM.
    2020 F150 3.5 Super Crew 4x4
    2020 Imagine XLS 17MKE

  3. #3
    Big Traveler Wicked ace's Avatar
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    Quote Originally Posted by jmmnhl View Post
    I’ll be a first time buyer. Looking at Transcend 245RL. Any thoughts. My wife and I. Also I have 2019 Ford F-150 2.7 Eco boost with 355 gears. Is that enough truck or should I upgrade to F250 V-8
    Looking forward to suggestions.
    Your truck while probably very nice as an all around daily driver as it is described will not handle a trailer that size. A discretely outfitted (not loaded with options) F150 XLT with a 3.5 Eco or 5.0L and the Max Tow package would be your sweet spot if you are looking for a truck to drive regularly and will ride decent with acceptable mileage. You would be in the 1700 - 1800 # payload range. The trailer you called out could top out at 1000# tongue weight so you would need every bit of that. An F250 will do the job too. Take a look here for specific questions and input regarding your truck or if you want to look into another Ford: https://www.f150forum.com/f82/
    Last edited by Wicked ace; 07-21-2021 at 02:15 PM.
    2018 F150 XLT 301a, Screw, 4x4, HDPP, Max tow, Andersen Ultimate w/ Curt Double Lock hitch.
    2019 Grand Design Reflection 150 series 260RD.... SOLD!!!!.

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    To help I thought I would use our rig as an example. This will be a lot so the TLDR is at the

    17MKE UVW 4,674 lbs (Ultimately this number doesn't matter as it only weighed that once when it left the factory)
    17MKE GVWR 6,395 lbs
    17MKE Tongue weight assuming 12% of GVWR 767.4 (This will vary based on how much stuff you carry, tank levels, etc but can be used as an example)
    2020 F150 3.5 Super Crew 6.5 bed 4x4 (Will call this TV from here on out) GVWR 7,050 lbs
    TV Payload capacity 2000 lbs
    TV GCVR 16,200 lbs
    TV towing capacity at curb weight 10,500lbs
    TV towing capacity with myself, wife, dog and a couple of hundred pounds of stuff still 10,500 lbs
    TV towing capacity considering tongue weight in payload 9862.6

    To start, Ford considers a 150 lb driver and full fluids in curb weight. I'm more than 150 so I have to add the difference in my weight minus 150, my wife, the dog and general stuff we have in the truck. Let's say all that comes out to 520 pounds. That leaves 1480 in payload capacity of the truck to play with. Assuming the camper is maxed and 12% for the tongue weight at 767.4 that leaves my payload capacity in a very safe place with 712.6 pounds extra to play with, but make my TV total weight 6337.4.

    Now my GCWR is 16,200, to determine how much I can actually pull I need to subtract my total from above from the GCWR which leaves me 9,862.6 lbs for towing. This doesn't mean I can run out and get a 9,800 pound camper and be ok, because tongue weight would go up as well.

    In this scenario, I have 3,467.6 pounds more towing capacity than my theoretically fully loaded trailer at 6,395. My personal feeling is don't exceed 80% of capacity for safety(80% of available towing capacity is 7890.08) so I'm well within where I consider a safe place. Other's opinions will vary on safety margin but if you're asking 100%, 100% of the time, something is going to give.

    From a standpoint of staying within ratings, this rig is good. If I had may trailer at full capacity and my truck at full capacity I'm still well below my GCVR of 16,200 pounds.

    But wait, there is more...if you read completely through the towing guide you'll find a small section no one reads that says, Trailer Tow Package(group 53A) or Max trailer tow package(group 53C) is required when towing in excess of 5,000 pounds. To further confuse things, my owners manual makes the exact same statement except says 7,000 for 3.5 EcoBoost and 5,000 for all others.

    TLDR as promised - So I typed a lot of stuff here basically to say that even if your 2.7 EcoBoost has the maximum possible towing capacity for that engine at 7,700 pounds, that it at least needs towing package group number 53A and likely, based on GVWR, payload capacity, and tongue weight, will have less capacity than the gross of the trailer and likely less capacity that the unloaded weight of the trailer.

    Also all of these numbers are theoretical, I will be weighing our rig on our trip next month to get the actual real world numbers just so I know.
    2020 F150 3.5 Super Crew 4x4
    2020 Imagine XLS 17MKE

  5. #5
    Big Traveler Wicked ace's Avatar
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    Quote Originally Posted by shaggybob View Post
    To help I thought I would use our rig as an example. This will be a lot so the TLDR is at the

    17MKE UVW 4,674 lbs (Ultimately this number doesn't matter as it only weighed that once when it left the factory)
    17MKE GVWR 6,395 lbs
    17MKE Tongue weight assuming 12% of GVWR 767.4 (This will vary based on how much stuff you carry, tank levels, etc but can be used as an example)
    2020 F150 3.5 Super Crew 6.5 bed 4x4 (Will call this TV from here on out) GVWR 7,050 lbs
    TV Payload capacity 2000 lbs
    TV GCVR 16,200 lbs
    TV towing capacity at curb weight 10,500lbs
    TV towing capacity with myself, wife, dog and a couple of hundred pounds of stuff still 10,500 lbs
    TV towing capacity considering tongue weight in payload 9862.6

    To start, Ford considers a 150 lb driver and full fluids in curb weight. I'm more than 150 so I have to add the difference in my weight minus 150, my wife, the dog and general stuff we have in the truck. Let's say all that comes out to 520 pounds. That leaves 1480 in payload capacity of the truck to play with. Assuming the camper is maxed and 12% for the tongue weight at 767.4 that leaves my payload capacity in a very safe place with 712.6 pounds extra to play with, but make my TV total weight 6337.4.
    Very good! IMO this where you should have stopped. Once payload is exceeded nothing more matters. In fact you would exceed payload long long before you got close to tow capacity. Once again IMO tow capacity is a sales number used by manufacturers and RV sales people to persuade buyers the truck can do more than it is truly capable of.

    Quote Originally Posted by shaggybob View Post
    But wait, there is more...if you read completely through the towing guide you'll find a small section no one reads that says, Trailer Tow Package(group 53A) or Max trailer tow package(group 53C) is required when towing in excess of 5,000 pounds. To further confuse things, my owners manual makes the exact same statement except says 7,000 for 3.5 EcoBoost and 5,000 for all others.
    Ford does make this harder than it need be as it is the result of offering three different tow packages that have three different receiver hitches. Look it up, all three hitches have different part #s . The Max Tow or 53C is the full blown tow package that anyone with intentions of pulling an RV should be looking at. I'll add one more place to look and that is on the receiver hitch which would be the end all. There is a sticker with tow capacities on it that looks like this:
    Click image for larger version. 

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    This what you get when you don't understand and I know it takes a good bit of due diligence to sort all this out. https://www.f150forum.com/f82/recent...-story-505273/
    Last edited by Wicked ace; 07-21-2021 at 03:35 PM.
    2018 F150 XLT 301a, Screw, 4x4, HDPP, Max tow, Andersen Ultimate w/ Curt Double Lock hitch.
    2019 Grand Design Reflection 150 series 260RD.... SOLD!!!!.

  6. #6
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    Since payload is often the limiting factor, is it an easy good starting point to simply divide available payload by 0.125 (midway between 10 and 15%) to get a quick theoretical weight limit of a trailer?

    E.g. sticker says 1701lbs; subtract 700 for “occupants and cargo” and get 1001/0.125 = 8008 for a ballpark GVWR to rule out potential trailers with.
    Douglas & Christine
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  7. #7
    Site Team Ynot4me2's Avatar
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    I have a F150 SCrew Lariat 2.7EB with 3.55 and tow a 22mle. It tows OK and we are able to pack what we need including geny in the box and 1/3 fresh for emergencies. Our payload sticker is 1426 (being a Lariat hurts this number) our tw is usually around 760. I wouldn't go any heavier. YMMV

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    Steph & Lise
    2019 F150 Lariat 2.7 EB
    2020 Imagine XLS 22MLE

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