Dodge Dakota Towing

[cdawley4]

Hi,

I am confused about the tow rating. I have a 2003 Dodge Dakota Quad Cab 3.9L V6 RWD truck. I will post the ratings from Dodge's Towing Guide below.

With 3:55 Rear Axle Ratio Axle Ratio You Can Tow 4400 lbs
Gross Vehicle Weight Rating (GVWR) = 6010 lbs
Payload = 1766 lbs
Curb Weight = 4244 lbs
Curb Weight Front/Rear = 2390 lbs/2390 lbs
GAWR Front/Rear = 3100 lbs/3806 lbs
Gross Combination Weight Rating (GCWR) = 8800 lbs

I was thinking if I found a boat less than 4400lbs., preferrably in the 3300-3500lb range, that I would be safe towing it. Am I thinking correctly or blowing it all out of propotion?

Thanks,

 

[JB]

Re: Dodge Dakota Towing

You would be technically okay (trailer must have brakes), CD, but most of we non-professional tow drivers should probably stick with loads on the order of 70% of the tow rating.

That would be a load of about 3,000#.

Good luck.

 

[cdawley4]

Re: Dodge Dakota Towing

Thanks for clearing that up JB. Is the tow rating affected with the extra weight of passengers and cargo, such as a cooler, fishing gear, & water toys? I would think not, as that adds weight to the tow vehicle, and is a part of the GVWR, as long as it isn't exceeded. I would think that if my GVWR was around 5K, my tow rating would still be 4400, regardless. Is that still correct?

 

[marquette]

Re: Dodge Dakota Towing

i always though that you took the GCWR=8800 lbs
-curb weight =4244 lbs
=4556 lbs
and started subtracting from that figure. everything. driver,passengers,dog, cargo,fuel , boat trailer, trailer hitch, absolutly anything that was not included in the empty curb weight. and then decide what you feel is a comfortable safety gap between actual weight and the vehicles GCWR. i agree with the 70% rule of the tow rating because it gets you basically to the same figure. Trailer Life magazine has a couple of really good articals posted on line that explain tow ratings and how to figure them. they also have a chart that shows some things that can be done to specific vehicles to slightly raise the tow rating or make them safer to tow with.

 

[cdawley4]

Re: Dodge Dakota Towing

Marquette,

That was along the same lines that I was thinking of as well. I have been to trailer life quite a bit, but couldn't find the articles you were talking about. I know of 2 things that I can do to beef mine up, and that would be to replace my rear end gear with a (edit) 3.92 (edit), as well as replace my engine with a V8. I would do all of those, but is it cheaper to replace those or find a new or used vehicle with everything already on it? I know it may be better to replace the components, as you will know they are new and don't have to worry about taking the vehicle to a repair shop if you find a good vehicle, let alone the payments if you purchase a used one and finance it.

 

[Silvertip]

Re: Dodge Dakota Towing

Although the GCWR rating is 8800 pounts, that's based partially on the front and rear axle capacity limits (3100F - 3806R). So regardless of the boat weight, you can overload the rear axle even though the boat is within the specified maximum tow rating. It all depends on the load in the truck and trailer tongue weight. As for changing engines, unless you have a free one and all of the required electronics including the ECM, this is an economically impractical solution so a different truck is recommended if power is an issue. Going to a 4.92:1 axle ratio is also impractical. 3.90 or 4.10 is about as deep as is practical. Gas mileage with a 4.92 would be worse than any monster v10 when empty or trailering. You can likely find an entire rear axle at a salvage yard for a few hundred bucks and swap the entire rear cheaper than just having someone change and set up the gears.

 

[marquette]

Re: Dodge Dakota Towing

the improvements Trailer Life suggests are a lot less radical than changing engines. for example on my Tauris wagon i can add a trans cooler and air bags to the rear springs and go from 1200lbs to 1600lbs. not enough to mean much but not a lot of cost or effort.

 

[marquette]

Re: Dodge Dakota Towing

trailerboats.com has several good reviews of tow vehicles and pdf"s of 2007-2009 tow ratings. i know they have a review of the dodge dakota but i don't remember what year.

 

[NYBo]

Re: Dodge Dakota Towing

It would be cheaper to sell your truck and buy one with the V8 and 3.92 diff. The diff alone would be doable fairly cheaply with a salvage yard unit. That will raise the towing capacity to 5000 pounds, IIRC. Don't forget to add the largest auxiliary transmission cooler you can fit.

 

[Titanium48]

Re: Dodge Dakota Towing

It would be pretty hard to overload the rear axle unless you were hauling a load of bricks to the lake with you. You could put 800 lbs of your buddies in the cab (400 lb on rear axle), 400 lbs of their stuff in the box (all on rear axle) and pull a 4400 lb boat (440 lb tongue weight, ~550 lb on rear axle) without exceeding the rear GAWR. You would be about 1000 lb over the GCWR though.

Considering how North American tow ratings are set by marketing as much as by engineering I'm not a big fan of the "70% of tow rating" rule of thumb. It works for full size trucks where manufacturers inflate the tow ratings as much as possible in order to be able to claim "our truck out-tows their truck", but it underestimates the capabilities of smaller vehicles where tow ratings are set more conservatively. I prefer the 85% of curb weight rule of thumb used in Europe, as the ability of a trailer to push a tow vehicle around largely depends on relative masses of the two.

For example, 85% of curb weight of the 5.9L V8 Dodge Ram is 4300 lb, and 70% of its 7350 lb tow rating (assuming 3.55 axle ratio) is 5150 lb. 85% of the Dakota's curb weight is 3600 lbs, but 70% of its tow rating is only 3060 lb. The Dakota has 90% of the GVWR, 85% of the curb weight and 70% of the power of the Ram, but its GCWR is only 65% of the Ram's? Something's fishy there.

 

[cdawley4]

Re: Dodge Dakota Towing

Titanium,

I agree that the tow ratings are a bit fishy, and feel that they are a contest for the bigger trucks. I don't understand why a Durango with the 3.55 axle with a 4.7L V8 tows roughly the same amount as my Dakota of the same year, whereas, a Durango with the 4.7L 3.92 tows roughly 1000lbs more. My Dakota tows 4400 with the 3.9L V6 3.55 whereas the 3.9L V6 3.92 only tows 400lbs. more. I do believe that they do it to avoid a law suit. You would think that a truck with a diesel in it would tow more since it has a lot more torque than a V10 in a comparable truck. I have seen the trucks in the few years past have GCWR's of 20000 and can tow upwards of 13000-17000lbs.

 

[NYBo]

Re: Dodge Dakota Towing

Vehicle weight factors in to towing capacity. A Durango weighs more than a Dakota. And the 5.9L has a lot more power than the 4.7L, so you're not making a valid comparison.

 

[willieboy]

Re: Dodge Dakota Towing

Having been a former owner of a Dakota CC 3.9l, I can tell you that there are a few things to make it a better tow rig.

1. Get the 3.92 rear axle. Salvage yards have them in all price ranges, but generally they are in the $200-$300 range. Give yourself a good afternoon if you swap it yourself (this is definitely DYI friendly so long as you are not scared of brake work).

2. TRANNY COOLER!! The 42RE that is in that truck is a pretty good tranny, but the need the auxiliary cooler.

3. Throttle body: Search EBay, the dakota specific forums, etc... and get the 5.2l or 5.9l throttle body. I think through 2003, those trucks still had a throttle cable, and you will have to upgrade to the V8 cable when you do it. You can get TB's from 97 through 2003. Make sure you are careful transferring the sensors from yours to the replacement. Doing the TB will be a noticable bump in HP and TQ.

With those three things, you are good to tow 5000 lbs, so long as the trailer has brakes. The tow rating for that year Dakota includes the truck full of fluids, and a 150 lb driver. Any additional weight you add to the truck has to come off the tow rating. That said, I used to pull a 4000 lb combination with me (50 lbs north of 150), my wife, Father in law, mother in law, and three dogs (labs, the smallest 75, the largest 125) to the lake, and had no problems. I did not have the 3.92 rear end, and generally wished that I did. I did not haul this combo a ton (4-5 times per summer), and it was only 25 miles each way. If you are going to be towing a lot, the larger rear end (both gear ratio and physically larger gear) would definitely be beneficial.

BTW, that truck will be a gas pig when you start hauling that much weight. Expect 12-13mpg at best. That V6 is working hard to move that much weight. Oh and the V8 swap is not too bad on those trucks. Motor mounts are the same, tranny mounts are the same (trannies are geared different for V8 or V6). Assumiong you can do the work yourself, you are probably looking at $1500.00 for the whole thing, assuming you sell your stuff.

 

[Silvertip]

Re: Dodge Dakota Towing

Titanium, I didn't say in this example that the rear axle loading would exceed it's limit. I merely suggested that this can easily happen. Using your numbers this vehicle would be 60# shy of the rear axle capacity (without the bricks). Rear axle capacity is listed as 3800#. Rear axle curb weight is 2390 leaving 1410# load capacity. Your numbers add up to 1350 leaving just 60# difference.

 

[cdawley4]

Re: Dodge Dakota Towing

Is it safe to assume, for arguments sake, that I can use either 70% of GCWR or 85% of curb weight and still be able to tow, as long as I am still under the tow rating of my vehicle?

For example, going by Titanium's numbers, I should be able to tow 85% curb weight of 3600 or 70% GCWR of 3060 and still be under the tow rating, as long as the trailer I am pulling has trailer brakes.

I guess the best thing to do is try to find something I can tow well under the tow rating, say around 1500-2500lbs possibly with trailer brakes, and then upgrade to a bigger tow vehicle later that will be able to tow a bigger trailer.

 

[NYBo]

Re: Dodge Dakota Towing

3. Throttle body: Search EBay, the dakota specific forums, etc... and get the 5.2l or 5.9l throttle body. I think through 2003, those trucks still had a throttle cable, and you will have to upgrade to the V8 cable when you do it. You can get TB's from 97 through 2003. Make sure you are careful transferring the sensors from yours to the replacement. Doing the TB will be a noticable bump in HP and TQ.

Very interesting. My 3.9L Dakota has fairly good low-end grunt, but it runs out of steam quickly. Redline is only 4700 - 4800 RPM. Better breathing would be great. I'll have to check this out.

 

[Titanium48]

Re: Dodge Dakota Towing

Is it safe to assume, for arguments sake, that I can use either 70% of GCWR or 85% of curb weight and still be able to tow, as long as I am still under the tow rating of my vehicle?

For example, going by Titanium's numbers, I should be able to tow 85% curb weight of 3600 or 70% GCWR of 3060 and still be under the tow rating, as long as the trailer I am pulling has trailer brakes.

I guess the best thing to do is try to find something I can tow well under the tow rating, say around 1500-2500lbs possibly with trailer brakes, and then upgrade to a bigger tow vehicle later that will be able to tow a bigger trailer.

You will be under the manufacturers rating (and thus legal) so long as the sum of your trailer and payload weights is less than 4550 lb (including yourself, your buddies and all your gear). The idea of the rules of thumb is to increase your margin of safety, as it becomes more difficult to maintain stability as the ratio of trailer to tow vehicle weight increases.

Your original thought of trying to stay below 3500 lbs or so sounds about right. If you decide you want a smaller, lighter boat it will be easier to handle and you will use less fuel towing it, but there's no point in getting a boat that is too small to fit your wants and needs. The idea is to have fun after all.

Functioning trailer brakes are essential if you will be anywhere close to the GCWR, but if the boat is under 2200 lb (half of the curb weight of your truck) they are not necessary. They're always good to have though, especially if you might be hauling a heavy load while towing.

 

[Titanium48]

Re: Dodge Dakota Towing

Titanium, I didn't say in this example that the rear axle loading would exceed it's limit. I merely suggested that this can easily happen. Using your numbers this vehicle would be 60# shy of the rear axle capacity (without the bricks). Rear axle capacity is listed as 3800#. Rear axle curb weight is 2390 leaving 1410# load capacity. Your numbers add up to 1350 leaving just 60# difference.

My example had to exceed the GCWR by 1000 lb just to get close to exceeding the rear GAWR. I can see exceeding the rear GAWR being easier in other vehicles with less payload capacity, but it is difficult to do in a truck without exceeding the GCWR first (unless you are hauling things that one wouldn't normally bring on a boating weekend).