How Much Can My Vehicle Tow
Wednesday, September 5, 2012 — 15 Comments
Before purchasing a trailer hitch you must first determine how much your vehicle can safely tow. Check your owner's manual to find out your vehicle's towing capability or call in to your dealership and provide them your VIN number and they will be able to tell you what your Gross Vehicle Weight is. | |
What Is Gross Vehicle Weight? The total weight of a vehicle or trailer when it is loaded including the weight of the vehicle itself, fuel and other fluids, passengers, and all cargo. To make sure your vehicle has not gone over its Gross Vehicle Weight subtract the net weight of the vehicle from the Gross Vehicle Weight. The remaining number is the maximum weight your vehicle can safely carry. If you tow too much, you could damage your vehicle. Once you have determined how much your vehicle can tow you must consider what your gross trailer weight is. What is Gross Trailer Weight? Refers to a combination of the weight of the trailer and all of its contents. It is the most weight that a particular vehicle can safely and reliably haul. To determine if you've reached the Maximum Gross Trailer Weight of a vehicle, take the total loaded trailer weight and add the combined weight of all passengers, cargo and equipment in the tow vehicle. Once you have determined how much your vehicle can safely tow and what weight capacity you will be towing, you can select a trailer hitch class specific to your weight rating. To learn more about trailer hitch classes follow the link to read our article What Class Hitch Do I Need? then use our Trailer Hitch search to look up the correct one for your vehicle. We hope this article could be of great help to you. If you need more information or have a question regarding this article please contact our team via live support or call 1.800.300.4067 |