Going up to 5th wheel

CD, be careful of the older Fords as they to had Transmission issues to. I owned a tranny shop for awhile and the two biggest money makers in trucks was the 1. Older dodge 2. Fords 150 (not as much unless they pulled heavy loads) F250, yep got a lot of them to. Chevy's I rarely ever saw.

I pull a fifth wheel and we keep it at the Oregon coast and have a 07 Dodge diesel. That thing with the newer and upgraded engine and transmission is a work horse. I have an older S&S Camper and last weekend I put it on the truck towing our 14 foot cargo trailer (w/bikes inside) to the All Harley Drags, simply amazing truck. It even has a Jake brake on it.

My brother has a older Ford F250 4X4 98 or 99 I think and I got to rebuild that tranny to. The older Fords and the Dodges with the diesels just had to much torque for the tranny that they installed with it. The older Fords with the V-8 gas motor had issues with the tranny also when it was used for pulling heavy loads. Not all of them did but the Automatics did have some issues. If you find one with a stick shift they seemed to hold up very well.
A good shift kit in the auto transmission really helps.

A Harley rider friend of mine bought a new Ford 350 in 07 and has already had issues with that diesel and Ford I have heard has a lawsuit against the maker of the motor. Something that I heard but have not confirmed.

The newer truck with diesels you can get some pretty good deals on right now, something to think about.

We had a 96 Chevy with their older Diesel pulling a 32 foot wheel, Bob will probably remember that one as we had it in Sturgis one year. the truck tranny held up good but the motor sucked, not enough power.

While you may not be GM the newer GMC and Chevy Duramax gets great ratings a friend has one that pulls his shop trailer all over, said he's never had any problems. I think it's the 6.6 duramax

Any of these with a chip or stacked chips really wake up the power.

Here is a link to a Duramax Forum you could check out the problems area to see what you'd be up against


Powerstroke Forum


Dodge Cummins forum

Used are a dime a dozen in this market but I'd still check new, down here they are all half price on the F150's Chevy and Dodge gas pickups.

You should be able to get a new or one or two year old one for half it's original value.

I run A Dodge 2500 diesel 209K five speed Pulls hard my son has a 99 Dodge 2500 diesel pulls a 9k trailer every day for work he has the auto At 207 had the tran gone through , son-in-law has a 06 Dodge 2500 diesel auto 4X4 pulles hard , My daughter & him just pulles a 30 ft G neck camper she said it was like it was not there & got 18-19 mpg non flat hwy her father-in-law in his Ford 6.0 was behind them with a small bumper pull trailer about 8x10 & got less mpg & has a some trouble with the engine
Go Dodge

Whe I was selling MAC tools a few years back my 18 foot MAC tool truck had the Cummings 5.9 turbo in it with the Allison tranny. That sucker pulled hard and the truck was very heavy with all the tool and tool boxes in it. I got 8-9 MPG with it.