Farmall Cub

I recently bought a Grand Caravan, I plan on towing a pop up camper that weighs 1650 lbs. Any thoughts if there should be electric brakes on camper

Seems borderline to me. Might depend on how much more stuff you throw in the trailer. Check what your owners manual says.

Read your owners manual regarding trailer weight, but if it were me I would definitely wnat brakes. Camper weighs 1650 pounds, camping gear, water, etc. in trailer and Caravan will add another 500 easy, plus people. Get an inertia brake contorller that has proportional braking such as the TEkonsha Voyager, or Prodigy. They are good dependable controlers.

THOM
If I were you I would get brakes on the trailer.I just hauled a small car on a dual wheel trailer.I used a Dodge caravan. Getting up to speed took awhile,but getting stopped took a WHOLE,WHOLE, lot longer.You can forget a panic stop.I think the total weight I was pulling was about 3000 lbs. Be carefull.Todays front wheel drive vechicles with light trasmissions
will not stand up to heavy hauling. Just my 2cents worth. Bruce

The Prodigy that John talks about has to be one of the smoothest brake contollers I have used.

This will be the cheapest place you will find the Prodigy.
http://rvwholesalers.com/catalog/produc ... t=0&page=1

Thom:

I have a 2002 Grand Caravan. I also have a camper frame trailer that I pull quite often with it. The trailer is a home-built, fully enclosed and will hold a fair amount/ The hitch is a GVW 3500 Class 2 hitch I think it is.

Anyways, I do not have brakes on it. I find it is not a problem to pull even fully loaded with Cub parts, implements and such. You do have to take care and pay a lot of attention to what you are doing. Be well prepared and anticipate stopping distances as it will increase. If you drive defensively, it should be no problem.

In fact, while we still had our 87 Plymouth Voyager, we pulled that trailer fully loaded with 6 bikes, two 8 man tents and all the accoutrements that a Mom of 5 kids would pack for a 2-3 week camping trip. Our 87 pulled it very nicely up and down mountains, twisty two-lane roads - you name it. We drove from our home in Dieppe to Niagara Falls by way of Ottawa... it was a real pleasure to tow, and did not concern me once during the trip.

I know my 02 will do it even better. Trailer brakes would make me feel a lot safer though. Bruce has a valid point. You do have to be careful, they do take time to work up to speed, but once there, cruise nicely.

If I was to rebuild that particular trailer, I would make sure that it had brakes.. electric at the least I would think.

I do hope that you do not plan on hauling your Cub with the Caravan. I WOULD NOT recommend contemplating that at all. I did think about it last year for Cubfest, but I soon got a little smarter. Course Em told me that if I even tried, she would smack me upside the head to ensure I re-thunk that idea

My wife tried to talk me into a minivan before our last vehicle purchase. We got a van alrighty- Chevy 3500 1toner panel with 9600GVW. Hydraulic assist brakes and L80E trans and full floating rear axle,YA BABY!!. My trailer weights in at 2,500 lbs. empty and rutinely hauls at about 5-6,000lbs. but have had as much as 10,000 on it. No problem, pulls like a dream. Hauled a car and a skidsteer both on it from Wisconsin 2yrs ago.

Now for the downside-Wife still wants a wimpy mini,I had to install two seats for the kids, and its get about 11MPG on a good day. So much for compromise.

Dan's Shadow wrote:The Prodigy that John talks about has to be one of the smoothest brake contollers I have used.

This will be the cheapest place you will find the Prodigy.
http://rvwholesalers.com/catalog/produc ... t=0&page=1

I agree, I recently upgraded from a voyager to a Prodigy. Reallylove it. Got mine form southwes wheel. 124.95 including next day shipping.

I found a pic of the rig from the Wis. trip. Truck handled it fine. The new vans are a great improvement over the old ones. They really are trucks now with just more sheetmetal to cover your stuff. The frames are full box front to rear, not c-channel. I only have one set of brakes on the trailer but I've bought another set to add to the forward axle.

John *.?-!.* cub owner wrote:

Dan's Shadow wrote:The Prodigy that John talks about has to be one of the smoothest brake contollers I have used.

This will be the cheapest place you will find the Prodigy.
http://rvwholesalers.com/catalog/produc ... t=0&page=1

I agree, I recently upgraded from a voyager to a Prodigy. Reallylove it. Got mine form southwes wheel. 124.95 including next day shipping.

And here is one for $96.00 with FREE shipping for us cheapskates.

http://cgi.ebay.com/ebaymotors/ws/eBayI ... ename=WDVW

I have only used the cheep time/rate controlers. But it is a safty thing even with a lighter trailer on a wet road in a turn can push you around. Just from a material point $100 controler vs $500 dedutible ins. I like the sound of the Prodigy looks like that will be the next one I get. Surge brakes on a trailer have never worked well for me and always seemed to need to be worked on and end up being a pain.

Surge brakes actually work well but few are set up properly for the weight on the trailer. Their mostly on boat trailers so water isn't a factor and the load is always the same. If the master cylinder spring is right they will do a great job, problem is on a utility application the load may never be right for the master cylinder spring tension. My boat trailer has some of the smoothest brakes I've ever driven.

johnbron wrote: And here is one for $96.00 with FREE shipping for us cheapskates.

http://cgi.ebay.com/ebaymotors/ws/eBayI ... ename=WDVW

Talk about good timing - my brake controller has been tempermental lately. Here's a thrifty thanks, from one penny pincher to another!

Lurker Carl wrote:

johnbron wrote: And here is one for $96.00 with FREE shipping for us cheapskates.


Talk about good timing - my brake controller has been tempermental lately. Here's a thrifty thanks, from one penny pincher to another!

Wow Carl, You must have got one just in time. When I posted that info earlier today there was 3-available and now there are no-mo available.

I got the last one.