Tow vehicles - choices, choices!

[frank_a]

We hope within a year or two to get a 16 or 17' egg, probably a 17' Casita Spirit Deluxe if we can find one. In anticipation, and having had a number of tow vehicles over the years, we are getting closer to figuring this out. I want a 4 door truck, the wife wants an SUV. Hmmm.

So where we are now is between the Ridgeline or Tacoma for 4 door trucks, or the 4Runner or Grand Cherokee for SUV's. What we want is true 4 wheel drive, with primary drive on the rear wheels and 4wd engaging the front, and a 5000# tow capacity to give us plenty of leeway and flexibility.

I sure have learned a lot about tow vehicles from you folks, as well as from some folks on a classic boat website I frequent. You guys are the best!

Frank

[gmw photos]

Frank,
The Ridgeline is front wheel drive/AWD. From what I know of them also, the auto trans is rather suspect from a long term reliability standpoint especially when used for towing.
Tacoma is a good choice, and I don't know anything about the other two you mention.
If you narrow it to the Tacoma, you might at least test drive and consider a Frontier, as it is essentially the same, or at least very similar.

[frank_a]

Good catch. Here I thought I had scoped these babies out well. I like the looks of the Ridgeline, but will cross it off the list.

The resource I have been using for tow capacity is Trailer Life's guides (http://dcd96xmek71bc.cloudfront.net/...ced%20file.pdf). The Frontier does not have tow capacities listed, so was not on my radar screen. I'll check it out.

Thanks!

Frank

[gmw photos]

The Ridgeline has also been discontinued, so buying a new one isn't going to happen ( unless you found a new leftover sitting somewhere ).

[frank_a]

Gee, ya learn something new every day! Yeah, we're looking to buy next year after both my truck and the wife's car are paid off and we've saved a bit of cash. We plan on selling or trading the truck and keeping the Outback. Then, or maybe the following year, we'll get a FG camper.

Thanks!

Frank

[David B.]

The new Grand Cherokee has 3 different motor options. I am considering the diesel option, as it gets 30 mpg empty, and has lots of torque for towing. I do off road with Jeep Wranglers, so this is a capable option, but in 2016 the diesel will be offered in the Wrangler also, so I may just wait for that. We do have a Dodge Ram truck with the Cummins Diesel (1994) that doesn't know the 13' Scamp is even behind it, even on mountain grades in Arizona & Colorado, and yet at 55 mph in California & Oregon, it got 22.5 to 23 mpg towing, and 17.6 at 65-70 mph in other states (from Arizona to Michigan).

[frank_a]

That diesel option puts those vehicles above the 50 grand mark doesn't it? That is WAY out of our price range. They sure do look like a great vehicle though.

Frank

[Thomas G.]

Originally Posted by frank_a

That diesel option puts those vehicles above the 50 grand mark doesn't it? That is WAY out of our price range. They sure do look like a great vehicle though.

Frank

It is only money. Think of the bragging rights!

[frank_a]

With retirement less than 3 years away, I'm much less interested in braggin rights Tom. If I had my druthers, I'd get mama the jeep and me a tacoma!

Frank

[Brian B-P]

Originally Posted by frank_a

What we want is true 4 wheel drive, with primary drive on the rear wheels and 4wd engaging the front

I don't know why rear two-wheel-drive with part-time four-wheel drive is any more "true" than front two-wheel-drive with part-time four-wheel drive. If there are characteristics of the 4WD system that are important to you, then I suggest looking into those specific features. If the characteristics are anything other than which wheels are driven when only two are working, you might be surprised which vehicle has what. Pickup trucks and truck-based SUVs from the same manufacturer often have significantly different systems. A 4Runner Limited and any Tacoma, for instance, are fundamentally different in 4WD system design.

To me, true four-wheel-drive always drives all four wheels. Of the vehicles listed so far in this discussion, I think only the 4Runner Limited (but not lesser versions of the 4Runner) has that. Even the Grand Cherokee (Quadra-Trac I, Quadra-Trac II, or Quadra-Drive) only drives the front when the rears slip; this may be fine for most people, it's just not 4WD most of the time.

[Brian B-P]

Originally Posted by frank_a

The resource I have been using for tow capacity is Trailer Life's guides (http://dcd96xmek71bc.cloudfront.net/...ced%20file.pdf).

That's a good starting point, but is well known to be incomplete and occasionally inaccurate.

[frank_a]

I want the main drive wheels in the back for pulling my boat out of steep launches. The tongue weight presses down on the drive wheels, making it much easier to haul a boat out. Even when I had just rear wheel drive vehicles, I never had problems pulling my cuddy cabin out of a launch. Now we're pulling a travel trailer, looking for a bigger one, and still have a boat on a trailer to haul.

Frank

[gmw photos]

Ha ! ...Brian is kinda confusing me ( easy to do ! ) with some of his descriptions of 4WD and such !
To me, an easy way to think about it all is this: 4WD has a button, switch or lever that the driver must use to engage a transfer case to send power to the front wheels. I may be wrong on the following, but to my knowledge, there are no 4WD vehicles being made that use the primary drive as the front.
The other alternative is commonly called AWD, and these typically do not have any manual, driver selectable switch. The power is sent to the non-primary end of the car on an as needed basis, determined by the computer in the car. My daughters 2013 Rav4 is an example of this AWD. It is front drive primary, and the computer sorts out when to send power to the back.
Personally, I prefer a regular 4WD system ( like my Frontier ) where the rear wheels are primary, and the transfer case only engages when I flip the switch to either 4WD ( high ) or 4WD ( low ).
I think ( key word here is "think" ) that most of the SUV's have gone to the automated system of AWD since they are typically marketed to commuters and soccer mom's who can't be bothered to think about flipping a switch for drive system, while talking or texting on the phone and smacking the kids in the back seat.....( it's the modern version of it's hard to shift gears while sliding sideways thru a school zone at 65mph while drinking a cup of coffee and changing the cassette tape.... ).
I digress.....at any rate, I love the function of the 4WD in my Frontier. This thing is an absolute beast in deep snow and at least moderate mud. The 4WD in conjunction with the "ABS limited slip" works amazing. I have used this truck to pull a few stuck vehicles and the tractor out of ditches on snowy days, and it moved every one of them with ease.

[frank_a]

I agree with your assessment of terms George. The one SUV that is different is the 4Runner, as they are based on a truck chassis and offered as rear wheel drive/part-time 4wd (I assume they have a switch like my 4wd Canyon does). That is what I want, same as you - rear wheel drive with on-demand 4wd, and something that will tow 5000#s. As difficult as it seems to be to find out what drivetrains are in these vehicles, Grand Cherokees seem to be offered in RWD or 4wd, so I assume that is the same as the 4Runner?

Thanks!

Frank

[Thomas G.]

Originally Posted by frank_a

......... As difficult as it seems to be to find out what drivetrains are in these vehicles, Grand Cherokees seem to be offered in RWD or 4wd, so I assume that is the same as the 4Runner?

Thanks!

Frank

A good source of information is brand specific forums. For instance - 4Runner Forum. If you post a question on the specific operation of the four wheel drive system, you will get more information than you can use and typically the enthusiasts know more about the product than most car salesmen.

[frank_a]

Thanks Tom, but with the help of the web, I know the 4Runner and Grand Cherokee are true 4wd vehicles, with primary rear wheel drive.

Frank

[gmw photos]

Originally Posted by frank_a

Thanks Tom, but with the help of the web, I know the 4Runner and Grand Cherokee are true 4wd vehicles, with primary rear wheel drive.

Frank

Frank,

As Brian pointed out earlier though, there are two different 4WD systems available on the FourRunner, depending on SR5, Trail or Limited models. If you look at their pdf E-brochure, you can see which is which, although to be honest, I'd like to actually look at them in person to see how they exactly work.

http://www.toyota.com/content/ebroch..._ebrochure.pdf

[Thomas G.]

Originally Posted by gmw photos

Frank,

...... although to be honest, I'd like to actually look at them in person to see how they exactly work.

http://www.toyota.com/content/ebroch..._ebrochure.pdf

Or post a question on the 4Runner Forum.....

[frank_a]

If we get one, it would be the low end model with standard 4wd. I understand there is another system in a model we would not be getting. Thanks guys.

Frank

[Brian B-P]

Originally Posted by gmw photos

Ha ! ...Brian is kinda confusing me ( easy to do ! ) with some of his descriptions of 4WD and such !

I'm sorry if I have made this confusingly complex - that's certainly not my intention. The problem is that we're talking about inherently complex technology, and simplifying it in a way that doesn't match the requirements leads to misleading conclusions.

Originally Posted by gmw photos

To me, an easy way to think about it all is this: 4WD has a button, switch or lever that the driver must use to engage a transfer case to send power to the front wheels. I may be wrong on the following, but to my knowledge, there are no 4WD vehicles being made that use the primary drive as the front.
The other alternative is commonly called AWD, and these typically do not have any manual, driver selectable switch. The power is sent to the non-primary end of the car on an as needed basis, determined by the computer in the car...

That's arbitrarily defining "4WD" as rear-primary and manually activated. There is nothing about the number "four" which makes this make sense. Some people say that this is the "traditional" system, and anything new is "AWD", but then there are people who argue that it isn't 4WD unless it has a two-speed transfer case, which is why I wanted a more specific definition of what feature is desired.

Okay, so now we have rear-primary (the most traditional system), front-primary, and real all-wheels-all-the-time (rare, and getting more rare).

It is not safe to assume that the presence or absence of a switch or lever means anything about the fundamental system operation. Switches can turn on drive to wheels which don't get it otherwise, but they can also lock up parts of the system which are getting drive anyway. No-switch systems are not limited to car-like "soccer mom" vehicles, unless you consider the Grand Cherokee to be one of those... and it is a rear-primary system. Many no-switch AWD systems have had no computer control at all: there are mechanical ways to detect slip and apply drive to the extra wheels, although the computer controls now make the system more responsive and effective.

The latest quasi-Jeeps (the new Cherokee) are front-primary and (perhaps optionally ) have a button to entirely disengage the rear drive (as did a Toyota Tercel and Subaru in the mid 1980's): does that make them "4WD"? Does it matter?

Originally Posted by frank_a

I want the main drive wheels in the back for pulling my boat out of steep launches. The tongue weight presses down on the drive wheels, making it much easier to haul a boat out. Even when I had just rear wheel drive vehicles, I never had problems pulling my cuddy cabin out of a launch.

Frank has explained what he is really looking for: it's not "true" four wheel drive or any sophisticated or rare feature, it's just that if only two wheels are driving they should be the rears. Frank, is manual selection or not (key to the definition of "4WD" above) relevant? "On Demand" more typically means "when the vehicle senses a need" than "when the driver turns it on". The preference to avoid front-primary makes sense to me, since if both axles are equally loaded the rear axle will have better traction when facing uphill, and when accelerating, which are of course the likely situations in which traction is important.

Many front-primary systems are always putting some power to the rear through some form of clutch, and may perform just as well as rear-primary in the boat ramp (or steep campsite exit) situation. If you don't trust the AWD control system to do this properly, then I suppose you stay with rear-primary or always four wheels driven.

That makes the selection:
Rear-primary:

• any pickup truck other than the Ridgeline (so, yes, Tacoma... but also Frontier and Colorado/Canyon in the less-than-full size)
• SUVs which share chassis with pickup trucks (Toyota 4Runner, FJ, Sequoia; GM/Chev/Cadillac Tahoe, Suburban, Escalade; Ford Expedition; Nissan Xterra, Armada)
• Jeep Grand Cherokee and Wrangler, and Dodge Durango
• various expensive stuff (some Mercedes, etc)

All-the-time:

• Toyota 4Runner Limited (and older versions of RAV4, Sienna)
• Ford? GM? Chrysler? - I don't know of any
• probably some high-performance cars unsuitable for towing
• maybe still some Subaru variation
• various expensive stuff

With that list as food for thought, someone might have specific suggestions that would appeal to Frank... or maybe he has already covered everything of interest.