Mounting a 5th wheel trailer on a 5 ton?

[Hootch]

Long time lurker, first time poster here, so please don't tear me up too bad. I am a year or so away (finishing my Bachelors after raising 4 boys...) from buying a 5 ton. While some folks here have made some amazing RV's out of the Duece, I'm wondering is it is possible/practical to mount a RV trailer or 5th wheel type RV on a 5 ton. It has the carrying capacity and other features that would make for a awesome go anywhere rig. It seems like a lot of work to build a box van into a RV that could be avoided if I could mount a trailer or 5th wheel on the back of a LWB 5 ton. Is this a practical dream, or just not feasible due to height, too top heavy, or other restrictions? Having a toilet, kitchen, and sleeping area will go a long ways towards convincing my Lovely Bride of 22 years that this is something that we should do before we retire. I have looked, but have not found where anyone has done this. I have a 45 Willys that will be towed behind for a run about rig. Any suggestions or outright "you've got to be kiddings" will be appreciated. Thanks for the great forum. Hootch

 

[andy3]

Lots of folks have mounted trailers to their Deuces or 5 Tons. One of my favorite threads is

Inexpensive-camper-utiliy-box-for-m35a2
http://www.steelsoldiers.com/showthread.php?t=65540

Do some good searches. Congrats on the awesome job raising your kids & milestones. Welcome to the madness!

 

[quickfarms]

The issue with a fifth wheel mounted on a 5 ton is height.

 

[srodocker]

Yea im going to run into some height issues I already know with a slide-in camper in the bed of my 5ton.

 

[Hootch]

Thanks for the replies. I kinda figured that height was going to be an issue. It seemed way too obvious for it to have not been done, but my searches didn't turn up much. The trick must be to improve my searches. Thanks again folks!

 

[Hootch]

One of the Hi Lo trailers might work. As long as the total height is below 12' when traveling, I think that it would be fine. A set of steps and the means to store them will obviously need to be done. Would it be best to make a mounting pad and just mount it where the leaf springs used to be, or should the whole trailer be bolted down? It seems that the leaf spring mount would give some flex room, but I'm not sure how much the 5 ton frame flexes.

 

[wreckerman893]

If you use an M927 without the super singles you might be ok if you used something like an Airstream trailer. My question is why not pull the RV with the truck and still have use of it for its intended purpose. When I pull my van trailer behind the M927 I'm 62 feet long but if you used a short wheel based vehicle you would be fine. You can get an adaptor to pull a gooseneck trailer with a 5th wheel tractor. I have one but have not installed in on our gooseneck lowboy since I sold my tractor.

 

[Hootch]

I am wanting to make the 5 ton into the house so that I can pull my 45 Willys as a support vehicle. That way the Willys can be used as a recon vehicle and for town runs while the 5 ton is the base camp. Thanks for your input!

 

[doghead]

East Wenatchee is not a state. Our rules request a state.

 

[Hootch]

Oops. It is fixed. Anything else?

 

[VPed]

I thought 13'6" was the legal height limit. I am thinking about doing the same thing with an M927. I think I have about 8 feet to play with and stay under the 13.5' limit. I want to pull a deuce as a runabout. Thought about loading the deuce and pulling the travel trailer but that would take some wicked ramps.

 

[andy3]

VPed, you are my kind of twisted!

I thought 13'6" was the legal height limit. I am thinking about doing the same thing with an M927. I think I have about 8 feet to play with and stay under the 13.5' limit. I want to pull a deuce as a runabout. Thought about loading the deuce and pulling the travel trailer but that would take some wicked ramps.

 

[quickfarms]

I thought 13'6" was the legal height limit. I am thinking about doing the same thing with an M927. I think I have about 8 feet to play with and stay under the 13.5' limit. I want to pull a deuce as a runabout. Thought about loading the deuce and pulling the travel trailer but that would take some wicked ramps.

A lot of modern fifth wheel trailers are close to 13.5' tall to the top of the air conditioners.

I know you can lower the trailer a bit by removing the under carriage.

People have mounted travel trailer bodies on standard civilian truck chassis

 

[VPed]

I'm thinking the fifth wheel route is somewhat troublesome. Between having the hitch part of the trailer over the cab and trying to stay under the legal height limit does not leave a lot of choice. there may be a fifth wheel model out there that would work but I think most would not. A slide in truck camper or a bumper tow trailer seem a better option in that regard. Civvy truck frames generally sit lower than MV's even before super singles.

Another wild-a** idea that runs through my mind is using a school bus body, simply because the roof line when viewed from the front or back closely approximates the look is a cargo cover. Lots of windows would be a plus. Wheel wells could be installed where needed so the whole thing could be much lower on the frame, kind of like an M109 box. Anyway...

 

[VPed]

Another problem the fifth wheel option has that needs a solution is most need access to the area that would normally be directly behind the tailgate of the towing truck. That is usually where a generator, batteries and propane tanks reside.