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Towing with 37s

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watican

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Anyone regularly towing heavy with 37s? What's your experience been, and would you do it again? Understood that it's less than ideal, just looking for accounts of firsthand experience.

Will be towing ~17k lbs with a HO 3500 one or two days every week or two for several years, and debating 35/37. Regear is likely in the cards anyways for lockers.
 
If you are towing that heavy and that much I'd do 35's. I have 35's and 3.73's and tow a 10k fifth wheel and cruise set on 70 it will downshift to 5th on most hills. If you regear to a 4.30 or a 4.44 if/ when they ever become available I feel like 37's are doable. Definitely would not be as enjoyable though if you had 3.73's and 37's.
 
I went back and forth on this too and ended up going with 35" for my fifth wheel mainly because of height. I was only able to find one tire (Nitto Recon Grappler) in a 35x12.5R17 that carries a load rating higher than 3195. Hopefully they don't stop making it or I may be forced to look into 37's. If you end up doing 37's let us know how it goes.

Side note if anyone knows of another A/T tire that carries a load range of higher than 3195 let me know. TIA
 
slvrsix7 said:
I went back and forth on this too and ended up going with 35" for my fifth wheel mainly because of height. I was only able to find one tire (Nitto Recon Grappler) in a 35x12.5R17 that carries a load rating higher than 3195. Hopefully they don't stop making it or I may be forced to look into 37's. If you end up doing 37's let us know how it goes.

Side note if anyone knows of another A/T tire that carries a load range of higher than 3195 let me know. TIA
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That's the other concern I have, is height. The 5er is also not here yet, so I don't know what the ride height needs to be to keep it mostly level. Not sure if I can fit the gears in the budget before we sell the house and start full-timing, so there would likely be some time where I'm towing with the 3.73s.

Any issues with the taller sidewall of the 17" wheel? What's the pin weight of your 5er?
 
loveracing1988 said:
If you are towing that heavy and that much I'd do 35's. I have 35's and 3.73's and tow a 10k fifth wheel and cruise set on 70 it will downshift to 5th on most hills. If you regear to a 4.30 or a 4.44 if/ when they ever become available I feel like 37's are doable. Definitely would not be as enjoyable though if you had 3.73's and 37's.
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Unless I got the stock size wrong, wouldn't 4.10s bring it back to almost stock ratios? Or are you saying it's under-geared from the factory too?
 

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I don't have the wheels/tires yet.
 
I’ve only towed my 12k lb fifth wheel a few times with 37’s and SO 6.7 I don’t find it too bad but I’m also in a relatively flat area. Everyone ran 35’s on the 4th gens with the 3.42 ratio which works out pretty close to the same final drive ratio as 3.73’s and 37’s.
 
Oh, I didn't know 4th gens were 3.42s, that's good to know. I'm not in flat land, live in WY and go to CO often, the Ike Gauntlet is a frequent occurrence for us round here.
 
Spedly said:
I’ve only towed my 12k lb fifth wheel a few times with 37’s and SO 6.7 I don’t find it too bad but I’m also in a relatively flat area. Everyone ran 35’s on the 4th gens with the 3.42 ratio which works out pretty close to the same final drive ratio as 3.73’s and 37’s.
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Have you towed that rig stock too, for comparison?
 
watican said:
Unless I got the stock size wrong, wouldn't 4.10s bring it back to almost stock ratios? Or are you saying it's under-geared from the factory too?
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It depends on what you want your towing experience to be like. I want to run in 6th gear with whatever tire I have. With the stock tires and 3.73's you shift into 6th at 65 mph. With 35's and 3.73's that changes to 67 mph. Going up to 37's you'll be at 70 mph before hitting 6th. So for me I want 4.10's with 35's so I'll want a higher gear like a 4.30 or a 4.44 if running 37's.
 
watican said:
Have you towed that rig stock too, for comparison?
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Yes I have. You can definitely tell the difference in final drive ratio when getting up to speed which would translate to more downshifting on any type of hill. If you are regularly pulling through those mountains I would probably stick to 35’s or regear.
 
I see what y'all are saying, seems like 35s are the max without a regear for heavy towing. @loveracing1988 - maybe this is my ignorance showing, but wouldn't tow/haul mode lock out 6th anyways?
 
Is the trailer actually 17k lbs, or 17k lbs gvwr?

Maybe im old, but towing that load, in the CO mountains, multiple times a week with 37s sounds like the dumbest idea on the internet.

Stock tires and 4.10s if you don't want a miserable towing experience every week with that kind of load in the mountains.
 
It's 18k GVRW, about 15k empty. Here's the situation: we're moving into the 5th wheel full time, and we like to play in the mountains. 37s will give us the clearance to keep going everywhere we do now, and stock tires would preclude probably 80% of it.

The best possible solution wouldn't restrict our 4 wheeling at all, and we could tow unlimited weight. That's not possible, so I'm trying to learn about the remaining options. How much will it hurt our towing capability to maintain full off-road worthiness? How much will it hurt our off-road worthiness to maintain our full towing capability.

The internet is a big place. If you think this is the dumbest thing on it, you must not have seen much of it.
 
watican said:
It's 18k GVRW, about 15k empty. Here's the situation: we're moving into the 5th wheel full time, and we like to play in the mountains. 37s will give us the clearance to keep going everywhere we do now, and stock tires would preclude probably 80% of it.

The best possible solution wouldn't restrict our 4 wheeling at all, and we could tow unlimited weight. That's not possible, so I'm trying to learn about the remaining options. How much will it hurt our towing capability to maintain full off-road worthiness? How much will it hurt our off-road worthiness to maintain our full towing capability.

The internet is a big place. If you think this is the dumbest thing on it, you must not have seen much of it.
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Fair enough and my comment was obviously laced with some sarcasm. As you well know, the compromise between a machine capable of towing 17k lbs and a competent off roader is a big one.

Growing up in the desert myself, and having experience towing 15k lbs, that is not a vehicle I'd be intersted in building, let alone using lol. Could it be done? Perhaps but I'd imagine the price tag will be eye popping.
 
tire size difference between a 35 and 37 is minimal. that little of clearance gain alone, wouldn't be worth it, with your use case.
 
Based on the advice I'm getting here, agreed. It sounds like with 37s, the juice ain't gonna be worth the squeeze. We are also looking at options for increasing suspension travel and adding bags with Daystar cradles.

Still in the exploratory phase of the build, the only thing we know for sure so far is the truck will be a Ram HO
 
"Competent" off roader is obviously a relative term, since we're talking about $90k, 8k pounds, and 20-something feet long. Just trying to give up as little as possible. I like cake, I want to have it and eat it too.
 
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