I am thinking about buying a boat and i know how much my truck is rated to pull but i haven't seen any postings on craigslist that say how much the boats weigh. so all you guys with boats (or if you've just towed one) how big was it. Im looking at an 18' right now.

 

My lil 3.0 tows my 14' with 33's and 4.10 gears in the back fine. Took it out today and had probably 400lbs worth of gear and people (other than me).
Trevelyn1015 I think has a boat that probably around 18'. Maybe he'll see this and post. For reference though, what size engine you got? What gears?

 

sorry i have the 4.0 with 4.10s i think. also its an auto tranny and the hitch is mounted to the frame

 

With my level 2 I have pulled 3 quads a Dirt bike, razz and bunch of gear. Prally around 2k and it was fine. Hell zabeard pulled my derby car and his trailer and it pulled just fine.


Boats are normaly pretty light. My old dodge v6 pulled a 18 foot bass master just fine. and it was way underpowerd

 

I know a 26fot searay is too big for the ranger, F150, and pushing it on a F250...

 

A 26 foot searay is NOT too big for a F150, my uncle pulls his with a 2004 Silverado 1500 with a 5.3 in it. If the Chevy can do it, and it does it fine, so can the Ford!!! Trust me......

My truck is a 4.0 with a 5spd manny and 3.55 gears, I pull my searay all the time with it. Trailer gear and gas it sits right around 5500 pounds. Its a 215 weekender.

The truck in the pic is my old blazer, and I pulled this boat with that all the time. I am not reccommending that you pull this much with your truck, I am simply stating what I do, and it does good, not great but good. My old mans Trailblazer pulls this boat like a dream tho....

 

hmm... well, our 1987 searay sundancer which is tecnically a 268, 26ft 8inches, 8.5ft wide, with a single mercury 454. with the trailer is somewhere around 14K lbs. too heavy for an F150

 

Well I know the new Searays (26ft) are not that heavy... This is off of Searays website:

Specifications
Overall Length : 28' / 8.53 m
Beam : 8' 6" / 2.59 m
Draft - Stern Drive Down : 39" / 99.1 cm
Draft - Stern Drive Up : 22" / 55.9 cm
Dry Weight : 7500 lbs / 3402 kg
Fuel Capacity : 84 gal / 317.9 L
Water Capacity : 28 gal / 106 L
Holding Tank : 28 gal / 106 L
Dead Rise : 21° / 21°

Add the gas the trailer and the gear, you are sitting around 10,000-10,500 pounds. Like I said, my Uncles 1/2 ton Silverado does a fine job with it.....

EDIT: I just looked up the specs. on a 1987 268 Searay and the dry weight is 5,425 pounds. That is a far cry from 14,000. I don't want to be an A$$ but maybe someone miss calculated or something....

 

I tow a 19' Sea Ray with mine all the time. Basically down to the beach and back (2hrs each way) every weekend. With out overdrive on it's just fine, taking it easy on take offs to keep the tranny cool. It bounces a bit on rough roads, but that's just because the truck is short. I think the boat and trailer weighs in at 3500-3900lbs loaded up.

 

The towing isn't what kills ya its the Ramp up from the lake. The boat will have to break the suction. If you have a stick shift 4x4 use 4low. It will be easier on the clutch.

I tow a heavy old Fiberglass runabout boat with an heavy 85 Horse merc outboard. I have no Idea how much it weighs but it is the most I'll tow with a ranger. If it requires freeway travel I'd use the expedition. Now I tow it with the GMC and you don't even know its their. I got a hitch for the roadmaster, so as soon as I put 3.08 Gear in it I will tow it with that (Stock Tow pakage gears for a RMS) Although this year I am going to try to move up to a 17-19 FT Glastron with a 4.3 Volvo/penta Ib/Ob. I need more room in my boat.



~HJ

 

Aluminum Fishing boats are light! Fiberglass boats, are heavy as hell! I don't fish so I could care less about Fishing boats, But I am in love with Fiberglass ski boats. If you've ever tried to take them off of a trailer out of the whater, You'd know what I mean.

~HJ

 

You'll be fine pulling a 18 footer. I have a 19ft Sea Ray 182 and the truck does just fine.

 

I tow our 18ft bass boat with no problems. Just take the O/D off and be ready for crappy gas mileage.

 

i have launched my family's 17foot hewes redfish many times without any proplems

 

Weird, no one mentioned tongue weights. Hell, I could just about pick up my ball cusp and drag my 19' flat bottom on the trailer around the driveway.

 

My 25' - I wouldn't even think of touching it with my ranger...

 

u gotta be off on that cause my uncle had the identical boat as us, and he used his F150 once to move it into storage for the winter, and it REALLY struggled.... His other truck an F350 definitely notced it, but it wasnt that big of a prob for it.

Now, we towed ours with our 1977 E350 with a 460 in it... dad always unloaded the truck off all the plank and stuff when moving the boat cause it put a pretty big load on it... the big thing tho isnt really moving it, its stopping it. thats what people forget... after all it is on wheels. its stopping the load is what u gotta worry about, and there have been a couple instances where our E350 couldnt stop the load....

We were taken it to storage for the winter, and u gotta go down this HUGE hill.... at the bottom is a light... anyways... half way down the hill the brakes on the truck were gone... long story short, we hit the interesection at 70mph! LOL. thats when dad decided its best to unload the truck before we tow the boat.

yours truely standing next to our 268. 26ft dont sound like much, but its bigger than u think... tho looks small in the water... go figure



now here my uncles boat which is identical to ours

 

oh ya, and i would like to point out... the NEW way of calculating length of a boat is by INCLUDING that lil board on the front, AND the swim platform..... our boat's length is NOT determined by adding those two pieces in. I have looked at the 28's from searay, their smaller than ours.

 

My trailer with both seadoo XPs weighs about 1200-1400. Thats light. I can easily pull my 20' Yamaha LS2000 jet boat with twin motors.

And as far as pushing it with a ranger. I moved my ex's 21ft scarab with a 454 around the driveway before with my old '98 2.5L stick with 3:45 gears. Thats pushing it. I would venture to say I could tow it with my 4.0

 

alright thanks for all the replies i bought it this morning and i'm picking it up friday so i'll see how it goes.

 

Congrats man! Another boater!

 

One thing you forget to factor is that older vehicles didn't have as much power, and werent as efficient. A 20 year old or more F150 probably would have a hard time pulling that boat, but a new one, no problem. I know allot about searays, in fact, thats all I know because that is the only boat I will ever own. Like some people eat sleep and breath Ford, well its Seray for me.

I don't want to argue so I will give you the link, then you can see for yourself. There is a picture as well so there will be no confusion.

http://www.searay.com/Archives_Manua...elow/268WE.pdf

 

Tongue weights on boats is usually very little. Especially with the motor up for towing I can lift up my trailer with two Fingers. The heavy **** outboard on the back acts like a counter weight. When I am going long distances I put my beer Coolers and Gas tanks in the front of the boat so the trauck doesn't get squirrely.

~HJ

 

X2 in the row boat.....

 

don't know if this helps any but my brother tows his boat with his 4runner no prob...20 ft malibu and it tows it without a problem