Thoughts on towing a Salem 24rlxl cruise light?

[Jbruss08]

My wife and I are about to sell our home(hopefully for a great profit) and live in a travel trailer while we build a Barndominium.

We have been trying to decide which travel trailer we would go with and I found this one on a local lot for $30,000.

Room Vs weight. I have not found one like this or anything close. It is a hair over 5000 lbs and my JT is rated for 6000.

So, the question is… can I tow it confidently. It would be dry with no gear if we took it on a trip. At home it will be hooked to power,water, and septic and all of our stuff will be stored in a separate building.

Obviously the first investment will be a weight distribution hitch and a brake controller.

what are your thoughts?

https://forestriverinc.com/rvs/travel-trailers/cruise-lite/24RLXL/4614

Edited to say the most I’ve towed has been our Tahoe Q6 boat and that was a breeze.

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[KevinC]

I will offer a few points that may help, or not.

1. Don't just look at dry weight. What is the tongue weight? What will you be hauling in the JT while pulling? I will say you are maxing out your JT with a camper at 4500# dry. Anything over that and you are asking for problems.
2. Almost 29' is a very big camper for a JT. I understand you are looking for comfort while having to live out of it for who knows how long and little campers get old real quick.
3. Forest River is not known for current build quality. Living out of a camper puts a lot of wear and tear on them. How comfortable are you with the construction of what you are looking at?

KevinC

 

[Jbruss08]

I will offer a few points that may help, or not.

1. Don't just look at dry weight. What is the tongue weight? What will you be hauling in the JT while pulling? I will say you are maxing out your JT with a camper at 4500# dry. Anything over that and you are asking for problems.
2. Almost 29' is a very big camper for a JT. I understand you are looking for comfort while having to live out of it for who knows how long and little campers get old real quick.
3. Forest River is not known for current build quality. Living out of a camper puts a lot of wear and tear on them. How comfortable are you with the construction of what you are looking at?

KevinC

What kind of problems would I be looking at?
The hitch weight is 500 lbs which is a lot but technically within limits I assume. Do you have a suggestion of another Travel trailer or brand that I should be looking at?

My last option is getting something larger and then selling it and downgrading to something smaller after the house is built. All of the dealers around me offer delivery.

 

[KevinC]

I'm just offering insight so an already stressful situation (building home) doesn't get elevated while you are waiting.

This is just what I have been told by people more knowledgeable than me. RV's/campers built between 2020-current are having issues in build quality. Warranty work is delayed for months. Simple things are breaking. I would be hesitate in buying a new camper right now. Prices are still inflated also. I would be looking used, 2018 or even later.

500# tongue weight is without what is packed in the JT. That's pushing it.

Build quality will relate to trade-in value on the back in. RV dealers will tell you what you want to hear when you purchase. When it comes to trading in the reality of you buying a low end disposable camper will hit hard. Think of it as buying a Kia.

Find a good used one with the Sq Ft you need to live comfortably for the duration. Find a dry weight of less than 4500#. Look for dual axle, fiberglass body, wet bath with toilet/shower separate. Good fresh/grey/black water holding tanks. As large of refrigerator as you can find, since you are living in it.

Hope this helps.

KevinC

 

[ciagw]

Just towed our 224bhw 26 feet tongue to bumper, 4600 lbs dry, just shy of 6k when fully loaded.

31 deg C heat, AC on, many many long hills. Truck empty other than the roof top tent at about 150 lbs .

Haven't fully fine tuned the setup and comparing it to towing same trailer with ram 1500 ecodiesel.

With the ram 1500 it always felt like nothing was behind me.

With the JT ecodiesel, it's an entertaining experience. Never feels unsafe but you definitely know the trailer is there up hills, down hills, in the wind.

I have a 4 way WD and stabilizer hitch setup which makes a huge difference and I certainly wouldn't dare tow something this big without that.

However, oil temp never rose above 118 deg C, coolant at 112 deg C up big hills, transmission around 94 deg on long hills.

Still need to fine tune the towing setup like I said, but overall feels OK, the biggest downside being very poor visibility compared to with my ram - even with the clip on mirrors I am not too happy .


If I had to tow all the time the JT wouldn't be my choice, but for the 4 or 5 big reps we will do each year, feels just fine and most importantly SAFE. Just sticking to under 110kph at all times. 95 feels very nice.

Just my 2 cents.

I will offer a few points that may help, or not.

1. Don't just look at dry weight. What is the tongue weight? What will you be hauling in the JT while pulling? I will say you are maxing out your JT with a camper at 4500# dry. Anything over that and you are asking for problems.
2. Almost 29' is a very big camper for a JT. I understand you are looking for comfort while having to live out of it for who knows how long and little campers get old real quick.
3. Forest River is not known for current build quality. Living out of a camper puts a lot of wear and tear on them. How comfortable are you with the construction of what you are looking at?

KevinC

 

[Jbruss08]

https://heartlandrvs.com/rv-model/north-trail-21rbss/

So would this be a better camper for towing in your opinion?

 

[dcmdon]

How far are you going to be towing it?

how often will you be towing?

 

[Jbruss08]

How far are you going to be towing it?

how often will you be towing?

Maybe 300 miles one way… maybe couple times a year.

Beach or mountains because I live basically in the middle of the two in Alabama.

Nothing cross country.

 

[Labswine]

My wife and I are about to sell our home(hopefully for a great profit) and live in a travel trailer while we build a Barndominium.

We have been trying to decide which travel trailer we would go with and I found this one on a local lot for $30,000.

Room Vs weight. I have not found one like this or anything close. It is a hair over 5000 lbs and my JT is rated for 6000.

So, the question is… can I tow it confidently. It would be dry with no gear if we took it on a trip. At home it will be hooked to power,water, and septic and all of our stuff will be stored in a separate building.

Obviously the first investment will be a weight distribution hitch and a brake controller.

what are your thoughts?

https://forestriverinc.com/rvs/travel-trailers/cruise-lite/24RLXL/4614

Edited to say the most I’ve towed has been our Tahoe Q6 boat and that was a breeze.

If you go with that Forest River floor plan, you're going to be disappointed with having to constantly traipse through your bathroom to get to your bedroom.

I had looked at trailers with similar floor plans both bedroom in the front and the in the rear where you had to go through the bathroom to get to the bedroom. They felt really cramped.

This is what I went with...it's 27' overall and the slide out is long enough that when converted to another bed, I can stretch out flat (I'm 5'10"). There is a slide privacy curtain across the sleeping area if you happen to have overnight guests (or kids). It feels much larger inside than it is.

It's about 5,100 lbs total with all the stuff we take with us camping (food, clothing, dishes, etc.) and if I filled the fresh water tank that adds around another 250 lbs. Tows like a dream behind my stone stock Overland.

Here's the floor plan. It's Venture Sonic SN220VRB model. LOVE having the outdoor kitchen...bacon and eggs, the inside doesn't smell like bacon for the next two days (not that that's a bad thing but...) The main refrigerator is 110AC/12DC (depending whether on shore power or being towed) and the small fridge in the outside kitchen is 110AC only.

The front bed is a 'Murphy' bed that can fold up out of the way with a two seat sofa underneath. We jut leave ours down. This thing has a shyte ton of storage inside. Much more than expected. A nice entertainment center and the stereo (radio, etc.) has blue tooth connectivity so you can play your XM app or other music services through it from your smart phone AND, it's also a DVD player so you can watch movies when it's pouring rain out and there's nothing else to do.

We love ours. It's a 2021 purchased new 1/21. With some add on's like gel coat sealer package, three year extended hitch to bumper warranty, also the BlueOx WDH/anti-sway and Tenkonsha IQ Primus electric brake controller, the whole schmegeggie was around $32K out the door.

 

[dcmdon]

Maybe 300 miles one way… maybe couple times a year.

Beach or mountains because I live basically in the middle of the two in Alabama.

Nothing cross country.

I think it can be done safely. Though its not going to be pleasant.

You will feel a bit of the tail wagging the dog syndrome. If you keep your speeds down and stay in the right lane, it will be fine.

Its really not the ideal truck to tow something like that. But if the choice is between driving a truck you like less for 361 days per year and having a great time towing, or driving a truck you love 361 days a year and a slow tow 4 days per year, then I'd go with what you've got.

Go slow, don't take chances, expect the trip to be long and exhausting. I find that grinding away for hours pulling a trailer that moves the truck around to be stressful and tiring. You may be different.

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