| Urabus |
Is anyone planning on doing any towing with the 2009 Pilot?
The reason that I'm asking is because I've been reading the online owner's manual and on page 442 it says that towing is NOT recommended at all if you have 8 passengers. Seven people are OK but somehow that 8th person (165 lb) crosses the line.
This concerns me because even though I don't plan on towing, I'd like to be able to do summer vacation road trips with our 5 kids. We'll need extra cargo room so I was hoping to use a roof-top cargo box as well as a hitch-mounted cargo box. With 7 passengers the maximum tongue weight is 100 lb. A cargo box would probably weigh about 40-50 lb empty.
By doing this, would I be very close exceeding the Pilot's maximum weight capacities? |
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| mailmanwes |
| Yes i plan on towing, i hooked up my pop up camper, dry weight is 2,100 pounds probably about 2,600 pounds with our junk in camper. when hooked up camper bumper height only went down 1 inch. towed for about 15 miles to check it out. towed easily, i have weight distibuting hitch from my mini van but not sure if i even need it. will put brake controller on.:) |
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| dustino8 |
| You need to look at your GVWR (I can't remember off the top of my head what it is) in your manual. Basically this is what the Pilot is rated to carry including the weight of the vehicle itself. You can estimate the weight of passengers and cargo to see if you come close to this number. If you are close and feel uneasy, take the Pilot to a scale and get it weighed when its fully loaded with cargo and passengers. |
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| donx |
If you make sure tire pressure is a little higher than the recommended 32psi (I would go with 36-38 psi), I think you should be OK. It also depends on how heavy the 8 passengers are, if 5 of them are kids, depending on their ages, I would not even compare them with 8 adult passengers, they are probably equal to the weight of 6-7 adult passengers. In previous weekends, I have been hauling 7 adult + 1 8-year-old passengers with their fishing gears and luggage behind 3rd row and hitch mounted luggage basket, AC on all the time on highway. No problem at all. I think the Transaction cooler, power steering cooler and the MDX retrofit rear braces might also helped. :)
Next time, I will try the roof top luggage basket if I am running out of space. |
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| whizmo |
I don't think this has anything to do with GVWR, engine power, or cooling capacity.
Instead, I think Honda's recommendation is based on their assumption that the combo of filling the final row of seats AND the load of the trailer tongue weight would cause the rear of the vehicle to ride too low and/or exceed the weight carrying capacity of the rear suspension. I don't know about the 2009, but I believe previous years has a somewhat convoluted table of allowable tongue weights that decreased dramatically as you loaded the rearmost row of seats and put luggage in the back. With everything loaded up, the allowable tongue weight went essentially to zero.
It's not a black/white issue, even if Honda attempts to make it one. A lot depends on who you have in the seats, luggage load, total trailer weight, tongue weight, terrain, hitch type, trailer brakes, etc. Having said this, the Pilot is a relatively poor towing vehicle for an SUV and I would never consider putting eight people in the car and then attempting to tow anywhere near the rated towing capacity, except possibly on short trips with flat terrain. And even then, I'd drive very conservatively.
In your situation, it would depend on how much you plan on putting in that hitch box. Personally, I'd go for a bigger top box and ditch the hitch box which have nasty effects on handling with weight cantilevered out behind the vehicle in a situation where you're already have too much rearward weight bias to begin with. Your Pilot will handle better and you'll have better margins.
- Mark |
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| youbetcha |
Forget the issue with towing, how are you going to keep the kids from fighting? :2:
I'd rent a Suburban! |
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| macphanatic |
| As Whizmo points out, it's a physics problem. The Pilot is a front wheel drive vehicle. Adding too much weight behind the rear wheels changes the weight distribution which impacts traction, handling, and braking. |
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