Hey Folks,

We have a 1966 Fleetside Chevy C10 (half-ton) with a new 350 V-8 engine, disc-brake conversion, new tranny (still 3 on the tree), and a couple of other physical plant upgrades. We have the long-bed with the extra-spring in the back suspension. We have a bumper pull hitch welded to the frame with a 2&5/16th inch ball and a prodigy electric trailer brake installed. Never been worried about trailoring inanimate objects but now we have a a horse.

Needless to say there isn't a lot of data about the towing capacity for 1966 Chevy's. We are thinking about purchasing a TrailsWest Santa Fe II 2HBP trailer. Here are some specs from their site:

Weight 3470
Tongue 650
Axle 3500#

We will be primarily pulling one horse (ocassionally a second for short distances). The horse weighs approx 1800#.

Anyone remember of have any experience pulling with a 1966 Chevy?

Any sense of whether we might be in the ballpark for safe towing with that tow vehicle/trailer combo?

Two people we have spoken with said "bah with that truck you will have no problem" but one of those was the sales rep and well....

Also, any ideas about needing a WDH with our set-up?

Finally, we looked at the Brenderup but wanted a more open airflow and the lower price.

Thank you in advance for any help you can offer.

Ottsca

Welcome to the forum ...
As you say, information on a 1966 model truck is a bit of a rarity...
All of the current GM tow guides require a WD hitch for trailers over 5,000 pounds. I don't see where yours would be different.
Another area that I am concerned about is the frame welded hitch. There is a lot of frame flexing and welds fail from metal fatigue. Inspect it closely and do it regularly. 650 pounds of tongue weight is a large load without a WDH.
Good luck to you.

Thanks for the feedback Hoss,

Yep, I agree about the tongue weight. I had the truck up on a lift last week and the welds look nice and tight with no cracking, but great suggestion to check them in an ongoing basis.

I'll keep ya posted

Ottsca

Hey Folks,

Just to let you know how it all came out with our old truck/new trailer combo....all was just fine....no problems pulling....one speculation was the absence of smog/emissions control on the old truck increased its overall pulling power. We did a couple of short and a long (3-4 hour) pull with our rig and all was fine. We used the hitch that came standard on the TrailsWest Santa Fe II and didn't do a special WDH.

We checked the welds and there were no cracks or visible weaknesses after all our pulls.

Thanks for the support.

Ottsca