Shed unwanted RV pounds before summer.
When towing it is critical to manage your weight. Not talking about your personal/physical weight (although that’s important too and we’ll have a post in the near future). I’m talking about how much weight you are towing. It is super important that your tow vehicle be set up properly and has the proper towing capacity. It’s also crazy dangerous to tow beyond the limits of what your tow vehicle and trailer rating is built for- see image above. I live by a series of 3 questions… “What can I control? What can I influence? And, What is completely out of my control?”. When it comes to storage, weight, and creative hacks… these are 100% in your control! Below are some of the creative hacks we’ve applied to help shed those unwanted pounds.
It would be beneficial if I put things in context. I drive a 2500 HD Sierra Denali and its tow capacity is 23,500 lbs. (way more than I need). My trailer has a tow capacity of 16,000 lbs. fully loaded. My challenge isn’t in what my vehicle can tow… it’s what the axles on my trailer can safely support.
First thing we did was make a list of the heavy items in our rig. Couches (we had 3 of ‘em), Generator, Water Heater, Microwave, etc. Second thing we did was look for creative ways to cut the weight down or out altogether.
Here’s what we got rid of/swapped out.
- Couches– we got rid of the clunky and heavy RV couches. Our trailer came with 2 lazyboys, a longer couch and a love seat. The long couch and love seat both had pull out sleepers… the frames were made of metal… and thus, very heavy! We took measurements and had custom organic futons made by www.TheFutonShop.com They fit perfectly and the covers are washable… plus if there is any damage they can drop ship them to us anywhere for $125. This saved us roughly 200 lbs. without having to lose the option for a sleeper.
- Microwave– we yanked it and had cupboard doors made from the manufacturer to match. Voila! Extra storage space in our kitchen. We never used a microwave (for a number of reasons that I won’t rant on in this post). For us it was a no brainer. We did however purchase a Breville Convection counter top oven. Saved us roughly 80 lbs.
- Generator– we opt’d to not have a generator installed in our trailer. Remember… trailers weight capacity is limited, my truck has way more capacity. We purchased a Honda eu7,000is generator and mounted it at the front of our truck bed right in front of the bed hitch. This saved us around $3,000 and it cut our weight down BIG TIME! Saved 622 lbs.
- Toilet– we swapped out the conventional toilet for a composting toilet. We actually increased the weight of our toilet by 2 lbs… however, by never using the black tank if/when using the commode… we never fill our tanks when traveling. This cuts down water consumption and massively drops weight when under tow. Check out our thoughts on composting toilets here.
- Water Filter– rather than install an Reverse Osmosis (RO) system, we use a Berkey Water filter. Super light weight. Made of stainless steel and the filters are light and last a long time. Truth be told, we fill up 5 3 gallon jugs of water at natural springs as much as possible (we find them via www.FindASpring.com) and we store them in the truck bed. In the unlikely event we can’t find a spring we use the Berkey.
- Water Heater– we had the standard water heater in our rig. It weighed roughly 150 lbs. We swapped it out with a tankless RV water heater (here’s our post on the unit we installed). Saved us roughly 100 lbs. and gave us endless hot water.
Total Weight Savings= 1,000+ lbs.
The last tidbit I’ll leave you with is this… let go. Let go of all the stuff you really don’t need. This philosophy holds true whether or not you are in a trailer, tiny home, or mega mansion. Let go of all the crap that you truly don’t need. And DON’T buy more crap once you get rid of the old crap. You will be happy with the weight loss. I guarantee it. 😉
