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Hi everyone! I'm new to the forum. I haven't had my Cayenne GTS for super long. I wanted to post on here to help anyone in the future who might be wondering about towing a Travel Trailer and the capabilities of the vehicle. This weekend we drove our new Travel Trailer from Ohio to Chattanooga TN. About 400 miles. Some higher altitudes on the way. Camper is 31.9ft long, weighs 5,950lbs dry, plus fresh water was full, so about 330lbs added to that. Didn't use a WDH or Sway bar. Used a Bluethooth Curt break controller. I gotta say I was nervous, I did a lot of reading and not many people have tried heavier trailers. It went really smooth! Weight and braking was a non-issue. Swaying sometimes above 65mph, mostly because it was quite windy. Semi trucks suck you in a little but not enough to be scary. Mostly I kept between 60 and 67mph since it was the first time towing with this car and my first time towing something this big. Definitely glad I got towing mirrors. I used the suction cup ones, worked okay, had to readjust once during the trip. I don't think I'll go west too much because I don't want to put too many miles on the car, but I don't doubt that this SUV could take any mountain road easy. Gas mileage up there was about 21mpg going mostly between 75-80mph. On the way back with the camper we got 11.1mpg.
Airstream - Love the floor plan and size is perfect for my wife, dog and I. I can fit pretty much anywhere without sacrifice interior space. In regards of the Cayenne I have my mechanic's update. The rear axle (left shaft to be exact) doesn't flex anymore, so when suspension is on high level it tends to drag and make clicking noise. This caused the servo-motor that locks the diff to skip teeth and brake which caused the grinding noise when taking slow turns. Also, we took apart the rear diff and we found out something very interesting. The 2 spider gears in the rear diff which actually are the ones who move and put down all the power have been worn out extensively. This is because of the heavy weight and these gears are made of cast. My mechanic is looking into 3D printing new spider gears that are made from a material stronger than cast in order to upgrade them. Cayenne is a great vehicle, it will be safe to handle the mass of the Airstream, but overtime it will wear items like gears that were not built to handle this heavy weight and are very very expensive to repair. If you tow only 2k miles/year that's not a problem, but we tow 7,000lbs about 10k miles/year and it can get expensive on the Cayenne.
Hello,
Curious to know the outcome. Are you still towing with the cayenne? Were you able to find more durable gears? Thanks!
Hi.
We are still towing the Airstream with the Cayenne. Odometer now reads little over 161k miles and we just came back from Alaska with an Airstream caravan. Out of the 32 rigs, one F250, and two F150s broke down and had to be towed. Cayenne had no issues and finished the trip flowlessly (other than running the 2 rear tires on the wires for the last 2k miles). Goin neutral camber will solve the problem from happening again.
OEM differential no issues, just changing the diff and CT oil every 20k miles religiously. Super easy job, takes an hour for front and rear diffs as well as the TC.
RaulGTS do NOT tow without WD. I cannot emphasize that enough.
Wow, this is really awesome, and I wish I'd caught this thread before we purchased our Grand Design XLS 17MKE. We wanted a larger RV but was very worried about the Cayenne's ability to tow safely. We have a 2013 Diesel, and it turns out that our recent 13 week trip around the country to visit family and friends went without a "hitch" (pun intended). We use no weight distribution and no anti sway bars and never had any scarry moments, even during times of very high wind. We typically go between 65-70mph and got about 13mpg towing and about 28mpg not towing.
We were told we should never tow an RV that is too long or the "tail will wag the dog" in high winds. We said to not go too much beyond where the Cayenne's wheelbase is >80% of the RV's wheelbase. Same for weight- stay within the 80% range. 17MKE weight specs- Hitch. 480. UVW. 4,674. GVWR. 6,395.
Many "experts" say a general rule of thumb is "you'll need a tow vehicle with at least a 110" wheelbase to tow a 20' trailer. For every foot of traileryou need an additional 4" of vehicle wheelbase". Our 17MKE is 22' so we'd need 118" to wheelbase with the Cayenne. But the Cayenne is 113" wheelbase. So, we thought 22' was about our limit in length on the RV.
I decided to wait on getting any WD or anti-sway bars until I test drove for a while before our big trip. We had high winds during our tests and no problem so decided against WD and anti-sway bars.
Now we still desire a larger RV but I didn't want to buy another tow vehicle when I love our CD. So, your post is fascinating to me because you are way over the rule of thumb limits, yet you have experienced a lot of varied conditions. I certainly would do a WD on a large RV like yours as well as anti-sway bars but that is a whole lot cheaper than another vehicle.
BTW, we have the TOW package on the 2013 CD with the Driving programs, differential locks, PSM and Hill control but we don't have the Active Suspension Management nor the height adjustment, air suspension features.
BTW, our tires have the same wear pattern and it worried me as a recent shop visit showed no issues with alignments. If you are using Michelin 295/35 ZR 21 tires, then you should note that Michelin makes these tires with extra tread on the outer wall for cornering considerations with sport cars. So, that wear pattern is to be expected since I doubt you or I were cornering at high speeds on our journeys. LOL!
09-28-2022, 05:01 PM
