Hi guy's,

I would like to know your opinion on how a 1999 F150, 4x4, with 373 gears, and a tow package, would handle towing a two, or sometimes a 4 horse trailer. I would be towing quarter horses. My wife has a quarter horse now, and wants to get a horse trailer to go trail riding.

I am open to suggestions!



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1999 F150 Lariat 5.4 Super Cab, Short Box, 373 Limited Slip Axle, Electronic Shift 4x4, Off Road Package, 4-W ABS/4-W Disk, Towing Package, Engine Block Heater, AM/FM/CD Indash, Rear Slider, Leather Captains Chairs, Wedgewood Blue & Harvest Gold, Luverne Stainless Steel Nerf Bars, Lund Interceptor, Ventvisors, Factory Rear Molded Mud Guards, Ford Motorsport Reg. Mud Flaps on Front, Ford Bedliner/with Rubber Mat.

 

Do you know the approximate weight of the horses and/or trailer?

 

Hi 54regcab,

Well a quarter horse weighs around 1200lb. And I would be towing 2 to may be 4. The trailer I think weighs about 1800lb, for a 4 horse trailer. I guess fully loaded with the horse's I could be at 6800lb. Then I include me and 3 people. Avg. weight 185lb. Plus around 400lb for extra gear.

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1999 F150 Lariat 5.4 Super Cab, Short Box, 373 Limited Slip Axle, Electronic Shift 4x4, Off Road Package, 4-W ABS/4-W Disk, Towing Package, Engine Block Heater, AM/FM/CD Indash, Rear Slider, Leather Captains Chairs, Wedgewood Blue & Harvest Gold, Luverne Stainless Steel Nerf Bars, Lund Interceptor, Ventvisors, Factory Rear Molded Mud Guards, Ford Motorsport Reg. Mud Flaps on Front, Ford Bedliner/with Rubber Mat.

[This message has been edited by JCAM (edited 12-02-1999).]

 

JCAM,

A lot of people here would say that is too much weight for your F-150. I think you could do it. Your trailer weight seems a little on the high side, I use a modified stock trailer for the horses and it weighs in around 1250 lbs. We pull four quater horses all over the place.

This is my cattle hauling example: 3 cows and three calves, 1500 and 500 pounds each, respectively. 6000 lbs of cattle plus 1250 lbs of trailer, 500 lbs of passengers and 3-400 lbs of gear and feed. 8150 lbs total. This load has been handled by our 79 f-150 w/ 351 V8, 91 f-150 with inline 6, my 99 f-150 with 5.4 and a 97 f-250 heavyduty with 5.8.
We have never had any problems and the trucks all had plenty of power left and barely sagged.
Be sure to have trailer brakes with controls in the cab. Remember to put the larger horses in the front. You might look into aluminum trailers for less weight.

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99 F-150 XLT 4X4 Sport, extd. cab, 5.4 V8, Black, color matched bumpers, four wheel disk brakes, four wheel ABS, 17" aluminum wheels, 3.55 gears, tow package

 

Your trailer weight sounds a bit conservative. My 2-horse steel WW trailer weighs about 2000 pounds, maybe a bit more. With gear and 2 horses, I'd put that at about 4000 pounds and my V-6 handles it fine.
(My horse is an Arab, and the other horse is a little guy, so we don't weight 1200 pounds apiece!!)

Mike

 

JCAM, I'd agree with 99XLTSport, I haul a 2-horse slant, usually with only one horse, but sometimes two, a couple of 5-wire bales, saddles, pellets and assorted tack, two ropers and maybe some beer. This usually adds up to 5500#, depending on the beer. The truck has no problem with this at all, but I don't think I'd like to pull any more than that.

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2000 F-150 Lariat SB Supercab 4x4 Off-Road pkg, Tow Pkg. 5.4L, Bright Red over Silver, Med. Graphite Guts, Rear Slider.

 

Wow, I did not know so many people had horses on here. We have two Tennessee Walkers and a racking horse. I just had the ball put in the truck on wednesday. It is a 2000 F-150 Super Cab 4x4 with ORP. I just came in from wiring it up. I pull a 2 horse slant gooseneck. I think the 5.4 is going to do great, I pulled it empty a few minutes ago to check the brakes. Just itching to go somewhere.


LHM

 

As long as you don't exceed the vehicles GCVW rating, you can tow safely. From the varied descriptions of what is being towed poseted here, I believe that some of you may be exceeding the GCVW rating of your truck.
If you know you'll tow, you should make sure your truck is capable of the load.
I've heard some scary comments on this board - like "If you can get it rolling, you can tow it".
Although that may be "true", it doesn't mean it's safe. Please consider that there are other people on the highway that an out of control, over weight vehicle can maim or kill.

 

Revis,

Beer is not an option! Its required. Horses are optional.

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97 F-150 SC Lariat, Styleside, White over Gold, 4.6L (Windsor), Automatic, 3.55 rear end, electronic 4X4, w/ every option of Lariat and ORP packages except the 17" wheels (I even got the OR decals now!), MOD's so far: K&N air box mod, Gibson Super Truck, clear Bugflector II, Leer TSC 600 hard cover, Bridgestone Dueler OWL ATP 265/75 R-16's, TrailMaster Invader N7 shocks, Smittybilt step bars, Ford moulded mud guards, "White-white" head lamps, Bosch platinum + 4's.

 

cphilip – That's true, and my competition times in the brew-lifting events are usually much faster than my roping!

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2000 F-150 Lariat SB Supercab 4x4 Off-Road pkg, Tow Pkg. 5.4L, 3.55 LS rear, Bright Red over Silver, Med. Graphite Guts, Rear Slider, Superchip.

 

horses here. 3 quarter horses, 1 thoroughbred, 1 paint, and 2 appendix (QHXthoroughbred). And 2 foals on the way in a couple of months.
the F350 does the dirty work getting the horses to the trainer - 4-Star 3 horse slant aluminum trailer. The trainer's Chevy 3500 (which we are trying to convince her to stop buying those) pulls the 6 horse slant to the shows.
Mudder's dad has cutting horses.

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'97 f-150 XLT V6 auto 3.55 silver reg cab flareside , 6 cd, Lariat floor mats, tonneau, ground effects, tint, glasspack w/ duals, new= ion optics fog lights, cracked windshield (thanks to a dodge caravan), 16X8 Eagle Alloys, K&N air filter (thanks Mudder). Future Mods= Billet Grille, driving lights, sunroof. the heartbeat stops here.
http://www.angelfire.com/ok3/ponysix8 http://www.angelfire.com/ok3/ponysix8/images/T004.wav

 

You'll do fine. Thats what the 5.4 is made for. Power, for towing and speed. Do not attemp to pull that trailer with a 99 up Chevy!