I have a 78 F250, 2wd with a straight 6. GVWR reads 6800, so my towing capacity is right around 2,000 pounds, I believe.

I need to replace the rear bumper.
I have no under-mount spare tire carrier - might install one in the future, might try to put it in the cab.
I have a 19 gallon fuel tank.

With all that in mind, what are some economical options? Given my limited towing capacity, I'm assuming that there are receiver hitches that can be mounted to the bumper or the frame that are suitable. But I'm also pretty new to the whole thing, so any advice is appreciated!

 

I think you can safely tow more than that off a good bumper hitch. Make sure the bolts to the frame stay tight. A bumper hitch actually keeps the loaded trailer closer to the pickup rear axle and can handle better, if you have the ride height of trailer correct. Tuning the trailer is very important to a proper pulling bumper whipper.. Correct tongue height and weight being the most important. Shoot for 10-15% tongue weight and a trailer stance of level or just slightly higher in front.

 

I have a frame mount receiver hitch on mine and it fit's from when Ford widened the frame (73?) to the 97 style. Have had it on my 78 and 95. Just had to add 2 shims to 2 of the bolts for the 95 and they came with hitch. If I was doing it again I would visit the salvage yards, most of the trucks from the 80's and 90's have one on them. In my case the bumper hitch worked but was always to high or to low and made it a little harder to back up for me when I had to jack-knife a trailer in somewhere. My spare and the gas tank are both back there with the hitch.

 

The GVWR is just the amount of weight (including the truck itself) that you can safely/legally haul ON the truck. In other words, in the bed.
The towing capacity rating is related, but separate.

Never noticed if there was a simple calculation you could make based on the other ratings, but it's usually best to find the stated tow-rating of the truck per the manufacturer. I'm sure someone here will know how to find that.

A standard truck bumper of that vintage might have had a tow rating from 3500 to 5000 lbs. While a heavy duty specialty bumper (such as a big V-drop center bumper or whatever they might be called these days) could be rated from 6000 lbs all the way up to 15,000 lbs or even more. Right from the bumper!
A bumper-mounted receiver is an option as well, but they're limited to the bumper's rating or even less. Say 2500 to 3500 lbs for the basic stuff.

But as said, the frame mounted hitches have some advantages. Not the least of which is the spreading of some of that load farther up the frame. Some of those big bumpers do the same thing with their mounts, but typically not as far.

With your truck I would think you could safely figure on 3500 lbs at least. The engine power and gearing might be your limitations first, before the usual brakes (very important!) and axle ratings. F250's of our vintage were not near the ratings of the modern ones (like what? 15k to 18k towing capacity right off the dealer's lot!) but they're still blessed with some heavy duty stuff.
If you have good gearing vs tire size then, you might be comfortable towing 5000 or even 7500 lbs.

But as a rule, I would say 500 tongue and 5000 tow unless you find something to say you could go higher.
Have fun, and be safe!

Paul

 

If you buy a new step bumper the manufacturer will give a tow rating for the bumper. Step bumpers usually have limited tow rating.

It may be worth looking around for a used frame mount hitch... several members have found one that way.

As far as what the truck itself can handle, agree it depends on how it is set up. 3,000 - 5,000 lb is a good guess. Do you know or can you figure out the rear axle ratio? That and tire size will help.

 

I wanna say my bumper is rated at 7000 but I don't remember where I saw that.

More importantly, Home Depot won't rent trailers unless it's a frame mounted hitch. Don't bother pointing out that the bumper is frame mounted, they'll just point to the contract and say nope. They won't rent to Mercury Mountaineers either. But will to the Ford version. Or vice versa, it's been a while.

Michael

 

I love a few of the answers of this post https://www.ford-trucks.com/forums/1...on-bumper.html
I am with some, bumper is made to hang the plate and for a step and that is it!


My truck is not even close to getting on the road and I already have the frame hitch mounted on it to pull trailers. 81 F100 4x2 300 six/T18

Put a frame mount hitch on the truck and don't look back.
Dave ----

 

Certainly no expert but I have seen so-called 'safety' bumpers rated at only 2000 pounds (was searching to find what mine is rated for.) Gear ratio is also a big factor. There is a Towing forum; I would add as much info as you can about the bumper and truck there and ask. My gut feel is that a Class III hitch is less than $200 and you would KNOW what you had.

 

Same as HoustonDave - frame recievers are only $150 or so NEW, so half that at the junkyard, and anybody can bolt one on with a socket and breaker bar, and some method of drilling 1/2" holes. The last one I put on for a guy was (I believe), a Draw-Tite brand, Class IV, and had side plates that bolted to the cross-tube. Partly so they could UPS it, I'd imagine, but also, you set them angle-in from 60-something to '77, angle out '78-'97. Pretty universal.

Use a bumper to fill the hole between the bed and hitch. Most (not all) bumpers have a pretty shoddy attachment method through the web of the frame, only 2 bolts/side close together. If you have any hitch bounce, it's almost impossible to keep them tight. They can be rebuilt to make them work, for sure, but then you lose the handiness of having a receiver hitch.

 

Thanks for the replies!

I have a standard D60 rear axle geared at 3.73.

I think I'm going to cruise the junkyard and look for a frame mounted class 3 hitch off some of the 80s/90s Ford pickups there.

Thanks again!

 

Class III: 3500-6000 pounds towing capacity W/weight distributing hitch and trailer brakes. Your limitation is going to be your engine and it's cooling capacity. Depending on tire size, I may be more comfortable with 4.10 gears.

In my 1979 owners manual, it doesn't list a 4.9l f250 in the towing capacity charts, but your d60, f250 frame, and t18 are plenty strong enough to do the job. I've got a 23,000lb truck that runs a 345cu inch IH gas to motivate it. It doesn't do anything fast, but it always gets there. I dog the snot out that engine, but it has a serious radiator.

Any serious towing involves paying attention to change intervals in the manual trans and diff. Contrary to poplar opinion, they actually do have change intervals.