Another truck/trailer match up thread- Tundra or 3/4 ton

[LittleMare]

Looking for opinions (and facts!) on my truck search. I hope this doesn’t end up posting twice. It was flagged as spam the first time and hasn’t posted, maybe because of truck brand names?

I have gone about setting up my rig in a somewhat backwards order. I found a great deal on a 2013 Merhow Equistar XL 2 horse gooseneck about a month ago, so went ahead and bought the trailer in spite of not having a truck to haul it with. I thought I had done the math sufficiently, but I am realizing now that I will not be able to haul this trailer safely with a 1/2 ton pickup. I will primarily be hauling my light (900-1000#) mare around Florida (read that as pretty darn flat), but do want to be able to pick up a friend + horse sometimes. Hauling every other week or so. We’re about to buy said truck. We cannot afford a truck just for hauling so it will likely be my husband’s daily driver as he’s the one with a 5 mile commute to work. The options I’m considering:

1) Sell trailer and buy a two horse bumper pull that can be pulled with a 1/2 ton truck- I looooove the Hawk trailers and looking at a 2 horse bumper pull with dressing room with a listed weight of #3200 it looks like I would be safe with that.

I’m considering the Toyota Tundra because of its excellent reliability ratings, but the payload would be close in that case if fully loaded truck and trailer
Another option is the Silverado 1500 that has a higher payload. I am steering clear of F150s since I have watched my dad have soo many electrical problems with his current one. And every truck before that has had to have the transmission rebuilt.

2) Buy a 3/4 ton pickup and keep current trailer. This is the more expensive option even if I sell the used trailer to buy brand new. However, from reading on here it is much better to be over-trucked that under-trucked, so this has that benefit. Plus I could keep the gooseneck to have that to sleep in if we go camping or to far away shows. I don’t have big plans to do this though, we are fortunate to live within 1-2 hours of a TON of great shows.
What are the best/most reliable 3/4 tons? Is diesel best for hauling?

So which option? And for either option, which truck? I’m going to go drive the Toyota Tundra, Silverado 1500 and 2500, and F250 and see if I love or hate any of them in particular that might help me make a decision.

[caevent]

Keep the gooseneck and buy a 3/4 ton! It will pull so much better, you can add a mattress to the gooseneck for camping, and you will never have to worry about how much hay, water, equipment, etc that you are hauling. I have owned an f250, Ã Silverado 2500, and a Sierra 2500. My favorite has been the Sierra, but they are all good trucks.

[TheHorseMutterer]

Following with interest - I am currently considering a 1/2 ton or 3/4 ton for towing my bumper pull two horse and plan to overnight test both and see how I feel about towing my trailer with it. SO is interested in a Tundra, but my understanding is that their towing capacity is not as great as other 1/2 tons (Maybe I’m wrong!). I know I don’t REALLY need the 3/4 for a two horse bumper pull, but if I ever upgrade, I don’t want to have to upgrade the truck too. Anything will be an upgrade from towing the my Tacoma (sorry), but I want to make the right move and pick something I can live a long time with.

Have you ever towed a gooseneck versus a bumper pull? That may also help decide some, as well. I have not personally towed a gooseneck, but it sounds like once you go goose, you never go back!

[endlessclimb]

If the truck is to be used as a daily driver…

Sell the goose and get a bumper pull. Parts and tires for the 3/4 ton are outrageous, not to mention the fuel mileage.

[happilyretired]

I used to have a Tundra and pulled a 2 horse Featherlite GN trailer. The truck handled the trailer fine – with the proviso that I generally hauled one horse at a time. In Florida I sometimes hauled two horses. In the hills of Western NY the truck handled the trailer fine with one horse (large warmblood) up and down hilly terrain. You have to be careful and pay attention to weight. You can’t load up the truck with extra people or heavy gear in addition to the trailer. But you will find that the new Tundra’s can handle more than some other half ton trucks. But all that being said you need to have a good understanding of the weight of your specific trailer and the specs for the specific truck as options can make a difference. I was happy with the truck but if I routinely had to haul two horses over long distances and hilly terrain I wouldn’t have been comfortable. I loved my Tundra truck though – reliable and comfortable.

[lightningevent]

I’m another person who hauls a gooseneck with a 1/2 ton truck. I did a lot of research before pulling the trigger, and I haul a 2H GN Sundowner with a 2019 Chevy Silverado. I grew up hauling goosenecks, and have actually never hauled a bumper pull because my father (a rancher) vocally disliked them so much. I got an incredible deal on my Sundowner, to the point that it was actually significantly cheaper than a comparable bumper pull would have been. I found the website for my gooseneck hitch was actually the most useful for researching towing capacity: https://www.bwtrailerhitches.com/towing-help-gooseneck.

[stb]

I am a Toyota fan. I actually drive a Sequoia, and pull my 2H BP with it for short distances. However, be sure you check out the gas mileage on the Tundra before you buy. It is pretty awful. Toyota makes great quality vehicles but I do not understand their terrible gas mileage with the Sequoia and Tundra models.

[LittleMare]

Thanks for all the advice. Love hearing what set ups people are happy with. The Equistar may be heavier than other goosenecks, it’s listed at 4270# on the inside of the trailer and I can’t make that payload work for any 1/2 ton with two horses and a passenger. Just me and my light mare is pushing it on the Silverado 1500 which has a higher payload than the tundra.

We went and drove trucks today. I loved the feel of the Tundra, it drove so smoothly. The salesperson said they were coming out with a hybrid model this next year to help with the gas mileage. She said the tow capacity would stay the same. But she also told us the Tundra had the highest in class payload. So I took it all with a grain of salt. At the Tundra mileage though, it might as well be a 3/4 ton.

I have hauled a gooseneck before, but with a borrowed F450. It hauled like a dream, but I’m positive I don’t need that much truck and I also didn’t have to park anywhere other than barns and shows. So I don’t know how much of the smooth feel was the gooseneck and how much was the massive (and expensive!!) truck.

We did stop by two independent mechanic shops in horse country and got told with a lot of conviction that hauling any horse trailer with a 1/2 ton was a recipe for burning out the transmission.

I’m mulling this all over. The 3/4 ton are not only more expensive initially, but as Endlessclimb said much more expensive to maintain. My husband really doesn’t drive more than 10-20 miles a day though, and since he’s so close we even could buy a cheapie car and he could drive that instead.

[SecondInCommand]

Take a peek through all the different packages offered on half ton trucks - there’s a pretty massive variability in models, both for tow ratings and payload. I did the same as you - got my ideal trailer first, and then did the math for what I would need in a truck. I’m towing a gooseneck with a properly equipped half ton. It’s shockingly easy to go over the payload requirement on a half ton, even when towing a 2H BP. So take a close look at the amount of weight you’d like in the trailer and in the truck, and make sure you compare to your payload and GVWR when shopping.

Personally I like this order of operations - dream trailer first, then figuring out what you need to pull it. The world is your oyster - good luck!

[Sdel]

You have to be careful with the bed length on the Tundra with a GN. With some models of the Tundra, the bed length is too short.

[Hinderella]

I’m a big fan of the bigger truck and I love my 1996 4 Star GN. It’s all aluminum, doesn’t weigh a lot, and we hauled it easily with my 20 year old Dodge 2500. We recently bought a 2019 Dodge, and I want to throw out a warning: The newer trucks (I think from 2015 on) have much higher bed sides!! My GN no longer has a safe clearance distance over the bed rails of the truck, so we’ll need to extend the GN coupler, and then block the axles to raise the back of the trailer as well. Lengthening the coupler alone doesn’t work, as it puts the GN on a slant that’s too steep. So if you opt to go with a new truck, find a way to test drive it to your trailer and confirm that you’ll have enough clearance! I love my trailer, so I’m making the adjustments. And besides, the cost of the adjustments are the fraction of the cost of a new trailer, and I only want a GN

[wsmoak]

> So if you opt to go with a new truck, find a way to test drive it to your trailer and confirm that you’ll have enough clearance!

… or consider a flatbed. My new Exiss automatically came with 4" blocks, but I still don’t like how close it is to the standard F250 truck bed.

[hunt_jumpfl]

Do you have to commute and if so will the truck be your daily driver? I had the Hawk/1500 (a 2009 Sierra) setup for 5 years. My truck is my only vehicle and I was also commuting a lot of miles during that time, but between commuting and hauling I chewed up my truck pretty quickly. I traded it in when my annual repairs were equivalent to a new truck payment. I decided to go up to a 2500 and fell into a really good deal on a nearly new Ram. I still have the Hawk, and I do like my new truck, but if I had it to do over I would go back to a 1500 and trade for an all aluminum BP trailer. I work in town and my truck doesn’t make clearance in any of the parking buildings. Parking in general takes some pre-planning in town. I’m also on the borderline weight wise for which parkways I’m legal on here in the northeast. All in all, the trade up wasn’t worth it to me when the vast majority of my driving in my truck are without my trailer. I would love to have my truck plus a little commuter car, but I just can’t justify the additional taxes and insurance on a second vehicle.

[LittleMare]

Well we bought a 2019 F250 diesel yesterday. We’re going to keep the trailer and try this diesel truck thing for a year. I’m going to log mileage towing with one and two horses and if it’s not working out to make sense, we’ll sell truck and trailer after a year and get a half ton and bumper pull. My husband will be driving it to his work daily, 5 miles from the house with a large parking lot. He has talked about looking for a different job recently though and if that happens we’ll reassess then.

I’m pretty good at logging things, so I’ll log the maintenance expenses as well so we can compare.

Thank you to everyone who weighed in, it was so helpful to read and hear experiences. I’ll update this in a year lol, especially if we’re hunting for a light aluminum bumper pull. There are a ton of Shadow trailers in our area that people seem happy with so I’m sure we could pick up one of those and sell the Merhow if we’re not using the gooseneck. They are very light trailers.

[clanter]

@LittleMare

My husband will be driving it to his work daily, 5 miles from the house with a large parking lot. He has talked about looking for a different job recently though and if that happens we’ll reassess then.

you may have issues with condensation build up in the engine because the short trips,