Mountain towing

[Tom Brown]

I am considering the purchase of a 2050 lb piece of equipment in Boise, Idaho. My trailer is 1300 lbs. That puts me at 3400 but with fuel, travel coolers, suit cases, etc... I expect to be at or beyond 4000 lbs.

The route will be Boise back to Montana and up into Canada.

The truck is a 2000 Ex, 4.0 SOHC, 4 door, 4x4, 3.73 gears (I think... it revs 2400 RPM at 100 kph in O/D).

Is anyone familiar with the terrain between Montana and Boise, ID? On flat land, I'm sure the Explorer would tow with no problem. The mountains are another story. I can monitor the transmission temperature but I don't want to try this if I'll be traveling at a crawling pace.

Any advice?

 

[MountaineerGreen]

You are right on the edge- question is, how large is the equipment? Meaning how much wind resistance will it create? If it's profile isn't much bigger than your explorer, and the equipment can bear the weather, why not use a lighter open trailer?

I'd add a transmission cooler, make sure your fluid is fresh. Make sure your trailer brakes work and you have a good brake controller.

 

[mawrazen]

Add a high performance auxillary tranny cooler. I even added an aux 12 Vdc fan from a Subaru infront of the stock tranny cooler and radiator. (To keep the tranny fluid from boiling while towing a 19' boat and trailer up mountains)

Good Luck!

 

[gijoecam]

Provided the trailer has a functional set of brakes, you should be fine. I think 4000 is a little high of an estimate, but in the ball park. Trans cooler will be essential, but it should pull it without too much difficulty. Keep the speeds down, watch the stopping distances (they'll be HUGE compared to empty) and possible install a weight distributing hitch if the trailer is loaded as such.

Which brings up another item: Watch how exactly you load the trailer. In general, for a stable tow, you want 10-15% tongue weight on the tow vehicle. That would require a WDH on your Ex. If you load it a little tongue-light (7-10%), you'll need to watch your speed to keep the sway down to a minimum.

-Joe

 

[Stic-o]

The Mts from lower Idaho to Montana arn't bad. No huge passes that I remember of, north of there, I'm not sure

 

[Tom Brown]

Thank you, gents. I'll post back to let you know how it goes.