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Jeepinator View Drop Down
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Joined: 08 Sep 2017
Location: Seacoast NH
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Posts: 72 		Direct Link To This Post Topic: Reducing Trailer Weight
    Posted: 13 Jul 2019 at 12:16pm
It’s time for our Pod to lose some weight. She clocked in at 4,080 lbs at her first Weight Watchers meeting!  I weighed trailer and TV with WDH tensioned (9,460) then TV only (5,380) with WDH in receiver. 

The label on the trailer says “Dry Weight 2,929”. Does anyone know if this includes everything it shipped with such as the awning, spare tire, power jack etc?

This is everything I’ve identified thus far but I’m 450 lbs short minus WDH tension.

WDH Tension  ??

2nd Battery 50

WDH Brack     30

Water, Fresh 80

Clam         40

Battery Box 20

Chairs         36

Crates       120

Food         50

Cooking.          40

Tools         50

Wood blocks 20

Wood Sign 20

Grill                 40

Crock pot         15

Waffle Iron   5

Dewalt Fan   7

Clothing & 

Bedding         50

Hookup Gear 30


I only had 10 gals of water and the WDH rods and brackets. 
2018 Jeep Wrangler Willys
2017 179
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Posts: 461 		Direct Link To This Post Posted: 13 Jul 2019 at 12:19pm
The short answer seems to be 'no." but there's a good thread on this right below labeled "dry weight."
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Happy Tripping View Drop Down
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Posts: 473 		Direct Link To This Post Posted: 13 Jul 2019 at 8:35pm
I'm not an expert but here's my 2 cents.

State parks and rv campgrounds have water and toilets so you don't have to use your trailer's. You might try the backpacker's axiom - 'When in doubt, leave it out'  (50 pounds of tools?,40 pound grill? crock pot and waffle iron?).

Whatever, you are right up against the printed gross vehicle weight rating of 5400 pounds and obviously over the vehicle's 3500 pound maximum gross trailer weight. 

That doesn't mean you can't go out and tow, BUT ...

1. Stay away from the Appalachians - Flatlands are your friend.
2. Expect shorter vehicle life because it is having to work awfully hard.
3. Go slow
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jato View Drop Down
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Posts: 3216 		Direct Link To This Post Posted: 13 Jul 2019 at 8:50pm
Quite sure that the weight does not include anything for batteries or propane tank(s).  Ours is only 2400 lbs but came w/o  AC, microwave or entertainment system so that probably adds up to 150 lbs, but on the other hand I added that back by adding 2 20# propane tanks and 2 12 volt group size 24 batteries; we normally boondock.  This is on a 2011  177.
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Posts: 72 		Direct Link To This Post Posted: 13 Jul 2019 at 8:56pm
Originally posted by Happy Tripping

I'm not an expert but here's my 2 cents.

State parks and rv campgrounds have water and toilets so you don't have to use your trailer's. You might try the backpacker's axiom - 'When in doubt, leave it out'  (50 pounds of tools?,40 pound grill? crock pot and waffle iron?).

Whatever, you are right up against the printed gross vehicle weight rating of 5400 pounds and obviously over the vehicle's 3500 pound maximum gross trailer weight. 

That doesn't mean you can't go out and tow, BUT ...

1. Stay away from the Appalachians - Flatlands are your friend.
2. Expect shorter vehicle life because it is having to work awfully hard.
3. Go slow





Agreed!   We have to jettison some gear. 
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Posts: 5290 		Direct Link To This Post Posted: 14 Jul 2019 at 5:12am
Originally posted by Jeepinator

It’s time for our Pod to lose some weight. She clocked in at 4,080 lbs at her first Weight Watchers meeting!  I weighed trailer and TV with WDH tensioned (9,460) then TV only (5,380) with WDH in receiver. 

The label on the trailer says “Dry Weight 2,929”. Does anyone know if this includes everything it shipped with such as the awning, spare tire, power jack etc?

This is everything I’ve identified thus far but I’m 450 lbs short minus WDH tension.

WDH Tension  ??

2nd Battery 50

WDH Brack     30

Water, Fresh 80

Clam         40

Battery Box 20

Chairs         36

Crates       120

Food         50

Cooking.          40

Tools         50

Wood blocks 20

Wood Sign 20

Grill                 40

Crock pot         15

Waffle Iron   5

Dewalt Fan   7

Clothing & 

Bedding         50

Hookup Gear 30


I only had 10 gals of water and the WDH rods and brackets. 

The 4080 should be correct for the trailer, wdh tension notwithstanding, because you first weighed the entire rig and then subtracted the TV by itself. IOW, the wdh doesn't change the total weight, only shifts some weight back and forth between the axles. 

If you want to know what's included and not included in FR's empty weight sticker take a look at the 2017 brochure here.



This lists the standard empty weight of the base trailers and on the second to last page it lists the weights of each of the factory options. Note that battery weight and specs are not included, so you need to add both batteries to your list. A single full propane cylinder is supposed to be included now,. Also, the 50 lbs of water we are all dragging around in our water heaters is not included in the dry weight, and there is probably another gallon or two in the plumbing, plus some remaining water in the gray and black tanks.  

I tried to reconcile the actual loaded weight of my 2015 179 (3740) and couldn't do it either, by about 250-300  lbs. I highly suspect that FR's empty weights are optimistic but the only way to prove that would be to empty everything back out to as delivered configuration and reweigh it and I'm too lazy to do that Embarrassed

If you can do so conveniently I'd also recommend running your rig through the scales again with the wdh not tensioned, this time getting a weight on the tow vehicle only (trailer axle off the scale). Then you can subtract your first 5380 lb TV weight from this second  tow vehicle + trailer weight to get your tongue weight. That might be more a limiting factor for your Jeep than the total trailer weight is. 

As to how much weight is on the rear axle with the wdh, the simplest way would be to just weigh the trailer axle by itself (TV off the scale) with the wdh tensioned. Note though that if the scale and roadway where the TV is when you do that aren't completely level with each other there will be a little variation as the wdh will be doing its job trying to accommodate the high or low spot under the TV rear axle. Should be a small variation though.

Short of that you can work backward to estimate the rear axle loading using this calculator. By working backward I mean that you can input your rig dimesions and weights and then adjust the tension of the hitch in the calculator until the load on the TV front axle is the same with the trailer and wdh as it is for the TV without the trailer, just like the adjustment instructions for the wdh say to set it. It's a bit of a PITA but doable. FWIW, my trailer axle came out at about 120 lbs additional from the wdh but YMMV. 


Oh, and last thing, I just gotta ask, what's in the 120lb crates and where do you keep them LOL?
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crankster78 View Drop Down
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Posts: 163 		Direct Link To This Post Posted: 14 Jul 2019 at 7:37am
Greetings:
I've found that due to the time it takes for the water to get hot in the water heater, the amount of time that you have to run the facet to get hot water,  It's easier to just heat up a large pot of water with what you need on the stove.  I'm going to turn off and drain the water heater to save some weight.  Most of the time I stay at State parks with showers, and when I dry camp, I take sponge baths.  I use a plastic dish pan to wash dishes in.  It works for me and I use less water.  I travel by myself, so this works for me.  

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Posts: 5290 		Direct Link To This Post Posted: 14 Jul 2019 at 8:17am
Interesting idea. 

What I've done to extend boondocking time is to install an additional thermostat for the water heater, set to 105-106 degrees (the perfect shower temp for us). That way we don't waste water fiddling with the shower temp.  We wash dishes once a day having wiped the dirty dishes as well as possible immediately after use.  We use water heated on the stove with a little soap in one of the pots we need to clean anyway. Only takes a few seconds to get the little water we need warm. Then we rinse using the sink hot water tap. By the time we're done rinsing the water is coming out warm so we take our navy style showers. We are only using maybe a gallon or gallon and a half or so each showering and another gallon rinsing dishes so never run out of warm water. 

My wife and I can go a week that way on 30 gal and still take daily showers, and by myself I can go over two weeks. We do bring bottled water in a couple of 2.5 gal plastic containers for drinking and food prep so that extends the dwell time a day or two. 

As we're camping in primitive campgrounds or dispersed camping 90% of the time I always travel with my fresh water tank filled, and I do have dual GC2 batteries. I keep the trailer weight down by keeping everything else as simple and light as possible. 

I agree that for folks camping in developed campgrounds with water most of the time that its better to travel with a near empty  fresh water tank, and if there's also a dump station you don't have to be that focused on water savings. I suppose to save weight you could also rig up a water heater drain that doesn't require pulling out the anode and then fill that and the fresh tank when you get to the campground. 
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mjlrpod View Drop Down
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Posts: 1214 		Direct Link To This Post Posted: 14 Jul 2019 at 11:13am
If we are going to talk water conservation here, i'll try to add something. I find that in a one week stay, i can stay just over 1/3 full. I think dishes is the big culprit. I do like I used to do when I tented. I fill a 7 gallon aqua-tainer with water and dish liquid. I first wipe EVERYTHING with wet ones wipeys until they look clean. Then i quickly wash them under the dishwash container (which is directly over a 5 gallon pail I dump responsibly) and lastly either a super quick rinse in the sink, or I walk to the water hook up and rinse it there. Very little water goes into the grey tanks from dishes, and NO grease or food particles. We only use bottle water as well, so no waste water goes into sinks. In a week, we will both shower twice in the camper, and sponge bath in between. If you shower at home before leaving, you never really go more than 2 days without showering. So 4 showers and a little of the rinsing are a third / third and a half of the tank.
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Posts: 5290 		Direct Link To This Post Posted: 14 Jul 2019 at 11:30am
Originally posted by mjlrpod

If we are going to talk water conservation here, i'll try to add something. I find that in a one week stay, i can stay just over 1/3 full. I think dishes is the big culprit. I do like I used to do when I tented. I fill a 7 gallon aqua-tainer with water and dish liquid. I first wipe EVERYTHING with wet ones wipeys until they look clean. Then i quickly wash them under the dishwash container (which is directly over a 5 gallon pail I dump responsibly) and lastly either a super quick rinse in the sink, or I walk to the water hook up and rinse it there. Very little water goes into the grey tanks from dishes, and NO grease or food particles. We only use bottle water as well, so no waste water goes into sinks. In a week, we will both shower twice in the camper, and sponge bath in between. If you shower at home before leaving, you never really go more than 2 days without showering. So 4 showers and a little of the rinsing are a third / third and a half of the tank.

I like your dishwashing protocol. I'd try the shower every other day thing too but my wife would make me sleep outsideLOL
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1995 RV6A Experimental Aircraft
2015 Rpod 179 - sold
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