Towing a gooseneck with a 1500

sdeeter19555 · October 25, 2017

Just returned from a cross country trip, two things I never really paid attention to and after reading threads on here I looked for. One I was surprised to see there are a few 1/2 tons with goose necks pulling campers. Two I was informed that most tractor trailers run 65 mph on the interstate, saw very few of those.

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Price of fuel is down, trucking companies remove the governor to allow more speed (and fuel consumption).

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Rme2513 · October 26, 2017

11 hours ago, Logan Lanfear said:

They would bolt right up, they probably have an additional leaf in the pack. RockAuto lists 3 different options for this truck, a 2+1 setup for three total springs in the rear. A 3+1 setup for 4 total springs and a 5+1 for six springs. The pack thickness ranges from about 2 inches to over 3 and a half. It would be very easy to check your truck to see which spring options you have.

Ok thanks I'll have to fine one and look at the spings on them I have a add a leaf I'm sure it helps some but probably not as much as the stock ones would I probably will still get a gooseneck I will be within the gcwr but just in the edge of the trucks gvwr and was wondering how they get a greater weight rating for them but looks like it's just in the springs

Cowpie · November 2, 2017

On 10/25/2017 at 2:52 PM, sdeeter19555 said:

Price of fuel is down, trucking companies remove the governor to allow more speed (and fuel consumption).

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Really? Please show me where fuel price is down. It may be from several years ago, but it is up, year over year. I drop about $60,000 a year is fuel for my semi truck and could use the break. And very few outside of trucking fail to realize, the more in fuel you use, the more in taxes you pay to each state, whether you buy your fuel in their state or not. IFTA is the rule of the game on that. And companies removing governors to allow trucks to run faster? It is not only fuel, but insurance and FMCSA CSA scores that drive company determination on max truck speeds. I have no clue how fast my class 8 truck will run. It has never been in top gear. I have had it up to 80 mph, but still in 17th. It has 18 gears. Best guess via calculation is that at 1600 RPM in 18th gear, I would be doing 103 MPH. Not even going to attempt that. I typically run around 62-65 MPH in 16th (direct drive), about 1400 - 1475 RPM. I beat the class 8 trucking industry average MPG by about 1.5 MPG. that is is savings of roughly $8,000 a year in fuel. Plus I get substantially longer life out of my tires by running at more moderate speeds. I average 225,000 miles on steer tires and 470,000 miles on drive tires. Far better than most trucks in the business. Hey, one drive tire for me is about $1200. Hey, it's a business! Every little penny I can squeeze in savings is more in net income. Guess that is why I remained substantially more profitable even thru the recession of the the past 10 years. In the first quarter of 2010, 70,000 trucks were shut down, out of business. I pulled a net profit that quarter.

But hey, I do encourage all truckers to run as fast as they can! Really! I can benefit from when they go out of business or are shut down for loss of CDL (more than 2 major violations in a year results in a 6 month suspension of commercial driver's license, and you can't get of it by taking a defensive driver class) or high CSA scores. And those high CSA scores? Many of the better shippers are demanding low CSA scores to get their business. I don't want to haul junk. I like my accounts that have great customers with virtually recession proof freight and pay higher than average rates for that kind of service. Very little of that goofy Big Box warehouse or food store warehouse stuff that doesn't pay worth a darn and can waste a lot of time loading or unloading.

Edited November 2, 2017 by Cowpie

Jon A · January 27, 2018

On 10/25/2017 at 6:45 PM, Rme2513 said:

Ok thanks I'll have to fine one and look at the spings on them I have a add a leaf I'm sure it helps some but probably not as much as the stock ones would I probably will still get a gooseneck I will be within the gcwr but just in the edge of the trucks gvwr and was wondering how they get a greater weight rating for them but looks like it's just in the springs

Yes, it's just the stiffer rear springs that give the extra payload to the NHT. If you have a fetish for factory stuff, the NHT springs will bolt right on. However simply adding airbags will give you a dramatically better setup than the NHT springs. If you're worried about blowing out a bag, it really just doesn't happen much if they're properly installed. The typical Airlift or Firestone bags people use on these trucks have capacities way, way higher than you will ever use. You're much more likely to blow out a tire. If you do blow a bag your suspension will sag down to the point it's sagging now, that's all. It would suck but it would be no worse than what you have now.

Rme2513 · January 27, 2018

23 minutes ago, Jon A said:

Yes, it's just the stiffer rear springs that give the extra payload to the NHT. If you have a fetish for factory stuff, the NHT springs will bolt right on. However simply adding airbags will give you a dramatically better setup than the NHT springs. If you're worried about blowing out a bag, it really just doesn't happen much if they're properly installed. The typical Airlift or Firestone bags people use on these trucks have capacities way, way higher than you will ever use. You're much more likely to blow out a tire. If you do blow a bag your suspension will sag down to the point it's sagging now, that's all. It would suck but it would be no worse than what you have now.

Thanks once I get the trailer and load everything on it I will see if I still need them and if so I will probably go with air bags or sumo springs thanks for the advice

Rme2513 · February 5, 2018

Hitch is in now just waiting on the trailer not to hard to put on but just seams like there's not a lot holding onto the frame one bolt and one u bolt on each side

Edited February 6, 2018 by Rme2513

Jon A · February 12, 2018

Nice! Is that a B&W? Don't be worried about how they're attached, they're very well proven and rated to way, way more than you'll ever tow with that truck. They're very simply the best way to put weight on and tow weight with any truck. Your sway issues are a thing of the past. It looks like it ended up 3-4" in front of the axle?

Which trailer did you go with? As you mentioned earlier in the thread, a lot of equipment trailers do have the wheels pretty far back so it's easy to get way more pin weight than you'd want so I'm sure you were careful of that. But if one is to push the limits of the payload rating, a gooseneck is the by far the best and safest way to do it, and it's much easier on your truck than a big bumper pull.

Rme2513 · February 12, 2018

10 hours ago, Jon A said:

Nice! Is that a B&W? Don't be worried about how they're attached, they're very well proven and rated to way, way more than you'll ever tow with that truck. They're very simply the best way to put weight on and tow weight with any truck. Your sway issues are a thing of the past. It looks like it ended up 3-4" in front of the axle?

Which trailer did you go with? As you mentioned earlier in the thread, a lot of equipment trailers do have the wheels pretty far back so it's easy to get way more pin weight than you'd want so I'm sure you were careful of that. But if one is to push the limits of the payload rating, a gooseneck is the by far the best and safest way to do it, and it's much easier on your truck than a big bumper pull.

Yes it is a B&W and is about 4" in front of the axil. The trailer is a big tex 14 GP 20' weighs about 3500# it is one of the lightest I could find around here for the price now just have to wait and see how it all goes when it gets here

Jon A · February 13, 2018

Looks like a nice trailer, one heck of an upgrade!

You were asking before about ratings. The newer owners manuals have ratings for 5th wheel/goosenecks for 1500s now which you could use as a rough guide. For example in the 2017 manual, the rating for a 4X4 Crew cab Standard box NHT 6.2 is 10,500 lbs and 8200 for non-NHT maximum trailer weight for goosenecks. These are around 1,000 less than for bumper pull from configuration to configuration for most 1500's as they're payload limited and SAE J2807 uses a minimum of 15% for goosenecks vs. 10% for bumper pulls. You can see how that added 400 lbs of payload really helps the rating for NHT's. Obviously, as with bumper pulls, those are maximums--not a guarantee every trailer of that weight will be towable without exceeding payload.

They don't list a maximum pin weight as they do tongue weight for bumper pulls as the payload/rear axle rating will be the limiting factor. But no, the 1200 lbs listed for bumper pulls does not apply. With a gooseneck, you don't need to overload the pin weight in order for them to pull nicely as you do the tongue weight with some bumper pull trailers but it can also be easy to do. It doesn't look like you'll have a ton of room for adjustment (it's much easier when hauling shorter stuff--skid steer, etc) but if you were having trouble with too little tongue weight with that load before, hopefully you'll end up "just right" with the new trailer.

Robopie · March 5, 2018

On 2/5/2018 at 6:57 PM, Rme2513 said:

Hitch is in now just waiting on the trailer not to hard to put on but just seams like there's not a lot holding onto the frame one bolt and one u bolt on each side

Didn't realize you were in GA until I saw the GON sticker. Whereabouts are you? I'm in Effingham.

edit: another vote for firestone airbags from me. Love them for all of my wide variety of loads.

Edited March 5, 2018 by Robopie

Rme2513 · March 5, 2018

45 minutes ago, Robopie said:

Didn't realize you were in GA until I saw the GON sticker. Whereabouts are you? I'm in Effingham.

edit: another vote for firestone airbags from me. Love them for all of my wide variety of loads.

Leesburg Ga

Rme2513 · March 14, 2018

Well here it is have only pulled it home not loaded yet but looks to sit ok have to see how it pulls in a few weeks

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