Windbreaker

Bill is right.

I had a 2000 Dakota quad cab, 4x4 off road, tow package, big v8. Thought I was set to go. After buying the TM the Dakota pulled it fine but I just did not feel in controll. I weighed the rig, super lightly loaded (one nite trial camp) and found that the TM was at 3600, plus the fully deckout Dakota at a little over 5000 gave me something like 40 lbs to play with before I went over.

Now remember I said I had off road that means steel skid plates protecting trans, oil pan, rearend. That is a lot of weight.

I would go to the dealer select the truck you like get the gvwr and look it up in the book to see how much you can add plus tow. That is where I made my mistake, the truck was way heavy and my TM (loaded and rigged for off road) was heavy and the two heavies were just too heavy.

Now for the up side. (If you're in love with the Dakota as I was this is not an up side) I found that the full sized trucks use very little more gas than the smaller ones. I moved to a Chevy 4x4 quad, 6 lit. v8 1500HD and I only get two miles per gallon less that I was getting with the Dakota. But the biggie is that while towing, I don't even know the thing is back there with the Dakota I did, big time.