Re: How Times Have Changed.
About 8 years ago I sold my 19' Renken to a buddy, for years I towed that boat with my 1989 Town Car (with a factory tow package and hitch). He had no tow vehicle, and wasn't interested in buying the car.
The boat weighed in at maybe 2500lbs tops on the trailer counting the trailer, fuel, boat, etc.
He right away went out and bought a 3500HD diesel GMC truck, full tow package, four door, 4x4, the works for the tune of something like $58K.
(All to tow a $1500 boat). His first weekend out with the new truck and my old boat went ok but he said the boat towed like a ton of bricks, he couldn't imagine how I ever moved that thing with my Lincoln.
I towed that boat for more than 10 years with that car, which at the time I sold the boat had accrued about 175,000 miles or so on the odometer. I bought it new and towed with it from day one.
It pulled that boat with ease, had zero issues launching it, and it even got decent mileage on longer trips towing. I also towed a 26' travel trailer with that car. It averaged about 17 mpg with the RV, and 19 mpg with the boat on a few 200 mile trips.
My neighbor though thought it felt heavy behind his diesel truck. I even went so far as going with him to the ramp and that truck felt every last buck and jerk from the trailer. On my car, the hitch put the boat slightly bow down on the road, it gave it a fair amount of tongue weight. On his truck, he went out of his way to make sure the boat was dead level, he moved the boat back on the trailer to give him more room between the bow stop and the tailgate, (so the gate would open with the trailer attached), and he was carrying both extra fuel tanks, his ice and coolers, and fishing gear in the truck, not in the boat. He had reduced the tongue weight to the point where he could wheel the boat around by hand with ease. On the way back I piled everything in the bow of the boat, it towed much better but he refused to listen and still complains about how hard that boat is to tow.
I still tow with my car, I've got a 2003 Crown Vic I bought used which also has a factory 2" receiver hitch on it. It does just fine with my 17' bass boat, and does it better than my truck does, and can carry up to four people while my truck, don't have room for passengers in the cab. I've also towed a buddies 18' cuddy cabin with my car, it does fine, I pulled that all the way to FL, over 1200 miles each way last summer with no problems and got 23 mpg doing it. My 1/2 ton truck would have had trouble getting 15 mpg and has far less pulling power. The car also has better traction on slipper ramps, I have to add weight to the bed of my truck, the car don't have any issues with traction.
I pull my boat roughly 10 miles here to the ramp, on occasion I haul it further to another location, but both ramps are concrete, both have lengthy dirt roads leading to them. I also don't care about leaving my car while I'm out boating and it don't seem to attract the attention that a truck does at the ramp. I'm only pulling about 1500lbs or so these days but it'll do more. I still have the old camper and have towed it as far as Virginia with my Crown Vic and its done that for almost 8 years now without any failures.
None of my trailers have brakes, they weren't built with brakes. If the factory didn't feel they were needed, I certainly am not adding them. The RV is a 26' single axle, with a coil spring suspension built in the mid 1960's, its super light and it don't 'feel' heavy at all in tow. My 12' jon boat 'feels' worse behind my car since it bounces and bobs all over the place on rough roads. When towing the camper I use a pair of 7500lb equalizer bars to stabilize the trailer a bit.
