Brand New to RVing and need advice

[idhunter]

I'm brand new to RVing and this forum, hoping to learn a lot!

I recently bought a 2008 GMC Sierra 3500 HD Duramax crew cab 4x4 with 150k miles to use as a camper hauler for me and my wife and two daughters.  After looking around for a while i found a 9' Fleetwood Caribou camper that weighs 3100 lbs wet and bought it.  I filled up the airbags to about 50 PSI and drove it home 150 miles and everything seemed to ride great. Once i got home i got to reading my truck owners manual about truck campers and it states there's a sticker in the glove box about max cargo weight ratings....sure enough it states a cargo weight rating of 1880 lbs. 

How come would it state a cargo rating of only 1880 lbs when 1880 + Vehicle are far less than the 9900 GVWR listed on the door sticker? 

Am I safe hauling 3100 lbs?  This is a big beefy truck and doesn't seem like an overly large camper, but the weight in the glove box has me concerned.  I see truck like mine or even smaller hauling big(er) campers all the time.  Am i missing something?

I'm running on brand new Michelin Defender LT265/75R/16 tires with a Load Range E rating.  Will these suffice?

Thank you for any advice you can offer.

 

[Matt_C]

IDHunter,

As soon as you can, take the whole rig to a truck scale and get weight for both front and rear.  When you pay and get that slip, do two things: write on it what the tanks were when it was weighed and next is compare it to the door tag that has the weighs allowed on it and come back here and tell us what that all says.  Without real data it is all just a guess.

Matt

 

[Rob&Deryl]

IDHunter,

As soon as you can, take the whole rig to a truck scale and get weight for both front and rear.  When you pay and get that slip, do two things: write on it what the tanks were when it was weighed and next is compare it to the door tag that has the weighs allowed on it and come back here and tell us what that all says.  Without real data it is all just a guess.

Matt

The driver door post yellow border sticker is where you should find the actual payload for your truck. The truck gets weighed at the factory just as it pops out and that sticker is unique to your truck. Some trucks didn?t get them till 09 I have heard but my 05 RAM had one.

 

[idhunter]

Sticker doesn't have payload number, only front and rear axle ratings.  I'll get to the scale at the dump and weigh everything.  Thanks for the advice.  Maybe you guys can help with my next question too.  I have Firestone Ride Rite air bags and on the driver side the airbag is uniformly compressed, however on the passenger side the airbag is bulging up toward the rear, slightly over the top of the top plate.  Is that a concern?  How does that get corrected?  Do places like Les Schwab or other tire shops work on airbags or do i need to take it to a specialty shop to get worked on and/or looked at?

 

[donn]

You are likely a bit overloaded.  Not enough to worry.  Air bags are so dead simple unless your incapable of doing manual labor why would you pay someone?  Be sure when you get your weights to weigh each side.  I suspect the camper when built was lop sided weight wise.  Closed DOT scales are almost always open.  Find one close by and go spend an hour or weighing it every way possible.  Once you have accurate weights adjust the air pressure in the bags to bring the truck to equal height side to side.  If a bag is bulging out its possible an impending failure.

 

[idhunter]

The air bag isn't bulging to the point that it looks like it's about to fail, it looks more like the top plate and the bottom plate aren't totally in alignment which is causing the bag to bulge out toward the rear some.  I'm pretty handy with a lot of things but this is a safety issue that i have zero knowledge of so I think I'd rather leave it up to a professional. 

 

[Isaac-1]

The only thing I can think of that might allow that is if one of the mounting studs on the airbag has sheered off.