Help please

Solososa]Hi,

Newbie, I try to buy a 2006 24t hi-lo. I don't know how much it weight. Some people say 3200 to 4200 and other say 6000. I have 2015 dodge Durango SRT with max 6200 towing in manual book. Will be ok tow this with the dodge...Please help?? Thanks

Welcome to the Forum!

This is a link to the 2006 Hi-Lo brochure:http://www.hilotrailerforum.com/f52/brochure-2006-hi-lo-8/

It says that the 24' Towlite has an empty weight of about 4000 pounds and a gross weight of 6000 pounds. Adding any options and filling the water tank all adds to the empty weight. Your Durango would be working to its limits I'm afraid. A rule of thumb is to not tow more than 75% of the towing capacity which would be 4650 pounds. You have to take into consideration the weight of the cargo, the hitch, and passengers in the tow vehicle as a deduction from the towing capacity. My opinion would be that you would be required to have a larger vehicle such as a pickup truck to do the job properly.

I am not an expert so I am open to correction.

I would try packing lightly and see how your towing experience goes.

With the newer tow vehicles I wouldn't be as afraid to tow up to there limit. It depends on so many variables. 20 years ago I would agree that you would want a 25% cushion.

I would start with no more than 400 lbs. of cargo/ camping equipment. For two people that could make for some fun camping. Choose wisely!

But as always use your brains! We can only offer free advice so you know what it's worth.....

Solasosa,
I live near some Interstates where truck oriented gas stations usually have scales. I have one only 6 miles from my house off I 26 and quite possibly other ones near by. I am a new Hi-Lo owner and plan to have my RV weighed at the nearby scale. Knowing nothing about the procedure or cost, I stopped there the other day and talked to a trucker who showed me the three different scales (you can visually see where each of the three scale platforms begin and end) for measuring the three axles on an 18 wheeler. With my Hi-Lo I think I could place my truck on one scale and the Hi-Lo on another to determine those two weights. I don't think my Nissan truck wheelbase is long enough, and I know the Hi-Lo wheelbase is not long enough to determine each of the 4 axle weights. Others on the forum have already used these truck scales and know a lot more than I do, but I'm saure you could determine the weight of your Hi-Lo trailer using this method. The trucker said that after pulling your rig onto the scales, you push a button and ask someone inside the gas station to print out a weight report for you. He thought the cost was $7.00
I wonder if there is a way to determine tongue weight using those scales?

Yes, there IS a way Doug. It involves driving onto the scales with the WDH leveling bars disconnected. Put the trailer's wheels on the third scale and your truck's axles on the first two scales. Weigh that. The weight of the trailer in this configuration is the trailer's total weight minus the tongue weight (which was added mostly to the rear axle of your truck).

Now disconnect the trailer so that the tongue jack and trailer wheels are all on the rear scale and again put your truck on the first two scales. Now the rear scale is seeing your trailer's total weight and your truck's weight is what it would be minus the tongue weight.

So, your tongue weight is the trailer's total weight minus what it weighed in the first weighing, or, the weight of the truck with the tongue connected minus the uncoupled weight. These two numbers should be very close - good enough for our purposes.

The reason the spring bars have to be disconnected in the first weighing is because they transfer some of the tongue weight back to the trailer axles too.

The CAT scale people will probably be very happy to let you do all this if you talk to them first and there's no trucks waiting to be weighed.

- Jack

One note you can't unhook or drop your WDH bars on the CAT scale to get reweighed. The attendant told me I had to move off the scale and go around because the scale won't reset with weight on it. Just went through this last month.

Thanks Jack and Gary for the "how to" information. We're in a persistent 10 day rainy period, so my work on the TowLite and the scheduled trip has been postponed, but I should be able to go to the scales and take those measurements.

garyk52 said:

One note you can't unhook or drop your WDH bars on the CAT scale to get reweighed. The attendant told me I had to move off the scale and go around because the scale won't reset with weight on it. Just went through this last month.

Click to expand...

If that's the case, you wouldn't be able to do the measurements the way I suggested, since you have to have the trailer connected to get it up on to the scale.

So, you could weigh the combination together (with the spring bars disconnected before getting on the scale - you're only going a tiny distance). Then, drive off, drop the trailer and get back on the first two scales with just the truck.

Then, your tongue weight is the result of subtracting the uncoupled truck weight from the coupled truck's weight.

When I did this, I was not told anything about the scales not resetting. Maybe some do and some don't?

- Jack

is there an AG elevator close buy?