bisonfan
Junior Member
Hello All... Hopefully this is the right section... I am looking to purchase my first pickup however I have a few questions about realistic towing within the publish towing guidelines.
My truck of interest is a 2016 outdoorsman CC/3.6l/3.55 gears/17" tires. I have used towcalculator.com to determine if my anticipated trailer/cargo are within the legal limits. The worse case towing scenario would be a 16' flat bed 4 place snowmobile trailer with 4 atv's. Trailer weight with cargo would be approximately 4000 pounds. Truck cargo/people would be 1050 pounds. Per towclalculator.com this setup would be 41% under the towing capacity, 1% under the GVWR and 19% under the GCWR. The anticipated route would include some minor hills but on interest 94 in MN. Max tow speed would be 65-70. This trip would only happen 1-2 times a year.
The more likely trailering would be pulling a 2 place snowmobile trailer with 3 atvs on it. In this scenario, it would be 74% under towing capacity, 6% under GVWR and 38% under the GCWR. I anticipate that the truck would handle this scenario flawlessly. I have trailered the same setup with my 3.6L Dodge Grand Caravan and not had any issues.
The truck primarily would be a daily driver hauling 1-5 people to get groceries, school, work etc... so most of it's life would be empty.
The question becomes how much of a factor would wind create for me while towing in the worse case scenario? Can the pentastar handle 3-4K rpms for 1-3 hours while towing to make the worse case scenario happen? Would this combination empty be same or worse empty MPG as 3.21 gear 5.7L?
My truck of interest is a 2016 outdoorsman CC/3.6l/3.55 gears/17" tires. I have used towcalculator.com to determine if my anticipated trailer/cargo are within the legal limits. The worse case towing scenario would be a 16' flat bed 4 place snowmobile trailer with 4 atv's. Trailer weight with cargo would be approximately 4000 pounds. Truck cargo/people would be 1050 pounds. Per towclalculator.com this setup would be 41% under the towing capacity, 1% under the GVWR and 19% under the GCWR. The anticipated route would include some minor hills but on interest 94 in MN. Max tow speed would be 65-70. This trip would only happen 1-2 times a year.
The more likely trailering would be pulling a 2 place snowmobile trailer with 3 atvs on it. In this scenario, it would be 74% under towing capacity, 6% under GVWR and 38% under the GCWR. I anticipate that the truck would handle this scenario flawlessly. I have trailered the same setup with my 3.6L Dodge Grand Caravan and not had any issues.
The truck primarily would be a daily driver hauling 1-5 people to get groceries, school, work etc... so most of it's life would be empty.
The question becomes how much of a factor would wind create for me while towing in the worse case scenario? Can the pentastar handle 3-4K rpms for 1-3 hours while towing to make the worse case scenario happen? Would this combination empty be same or worse empty MPG as 3.21 gear 5.7L?