I have two years to go before I punch out of the working world. In anticipation, I plan to buy a truck later this year and have all of the recreation equipment in place for when the day comes to go wandering. We already have a lightweight travel trailer, roughly 4,000 lbs fully loaded. Most of the time it will just be my wife and I in the truck but we plan to occasionally gather up the kids and their babies and head out of town. I want to be able to do that without hesitation.

The check list:
Carry up to four adults, a grand kid, and a dog or two
Bring along all of the camping crud for this mob: coolers, firewood, tools, chairs…
Bring a canoe, maybe two
Bicycles? Sure, why not.
Tow the 4,000 lb TT with all the above
Drive in Cascade and Rocky Mountains

From the research I’ve done, payload is going to be the main driver as I spec out the truck. It looks like I can do this safely with a lightly optioned F-150 with the HDPP package or with an F-250 6.2. The engines, of course, will be different but either would have the payload numbers for the load we will have and a bit for reserve. I’m curious if there are intangibles that lean towards selecting one truck over the other. Even if the F-150 HDPP and F-250 have identical yellow sticker numbers, there have to be long term differences between the two - they are distinctly different trucks. Has anyone run with both set ups? What have you experienced?

Thanks, all.
Bob

 

I think I'd want the heavier brakes of an F250 when you'll have 4k plus gear pushing you.

 

I can't speak to the 250 part of things (yet!), but I personally think you'd likely be fine with a 150. It'll ride better, for sure, and 4k isn't much. I currently have a 2005 F150 with the 5.4 and tow a 21' Attitude toy hauler that's calculated around 7k pounds loaded. However, this is a 2006 trailer, which was still the era of manufacturers getting... well, lets say "creative" with weight ratings, and I'd bet my trailer is actually over 8k loaded. If I drop into 2nd and stay on the gas I can usually hold 60 on decent hills if I want to, but I baby the truck and usually let the speed drop. Truthfully, it does fine. Combine that with the fact that the newer 150's tow WAY better than my 2005, it would probably be really worth your consideration.

For what it's worth, I also looked REALLY heavily at the new 150 Diesel. Within the next 6 months or so I plan on getting a Super Duty, and the ONLY reason I'm not looking at the 150 diesel, which would theoretically replace my 150 and my Honda commuter, is that I drive 30k miles/year and the depreciation on the 150 Diesel would kill me. I'd rather get a Super Duty that will sit in the driveway except for weekend trips and hold it's value at 5-7k miles/year, and keep my Honda commuter for the 30k miles/year. But it sounds like the 150 Diesel could be right up your alley. There's some great youtube videos of guys testing the 150 diesel towing through mountains, I think a few were actually in the Rockies, and most of them end with the guys being pleasantly surprised at how the baby diesel performed. Obviously, know that it's NOT a 6.7, but they do what they're meant to do. At the very least, would be worth looking in to!

 

I pulled my 6,500# 26' Forrest River with my 2010 5.4 SCrew F150 Max Tow without too many issues. It would wag the dog a bit when being passed by a semi, but as far as power, braking, and payload were concerned I still had a few hundred pounds of payload left. My 2015 F250 Crew Cab with the 6.2 hardly even noticed it was there. Fuel mileage was comparable between the two while towing, I got about 2 MPG better in the F150 unladen.
If you are going to be doing most of your towing in the Cascades and Rockies I would try to get into an F150 with the Ecoboost and a good WDH properly set up for your combo. WIth only around 450 to 650lbs of tongue weight you could potentially still have around 1k lbs of payload for family and gear. The 6.2 isn't going to perform as well at high altitude as a boosted engine, I live in the PNW and have towed in the Cascades with the 6.2 and it did okay at high revs, the 8.2 MPG was not so great though.
Both are good trucks and I don't have a bias either way, but if you can safely stay within the limits of the F150 I think your driving experience will be much more comfortable and if you do not plan to tow constantly the F150 will be better for your everyday driving.

 

The trailer will have it's own brakes.. it's not a snowmobile trailer with 4 sleds on it without trailer brakes.

4k is nothing for a f150 with trailer brakes. No reason to go SD territory for that unless it's just what one wants.

I've pulled a bigger camper with a 2004 F150 SC with the 4.6 with zero issues.

 

As long as you stay under 6K lbs towing, the new F-150 will do the job amazingly well. No reason for a super duty unless you just want one ... or if you want room to grow into a >30' trailer some day without having to buy a different truck.

With all the people and gear, you'll have 1,000 lbs or so of occupants and cargo on your truck. Add in 500 lbs for your tongue weight. That's only 1,500 lbs of payload. F-150s with 3.5 EB are going to have at least 1,700 lbs of payload without the HDPP.

 

I searched high and low to find an HDPP truck to test drive, but I could not find a single one in my state. I ended up getting a crew cab long bed F250 gasser instead, and even this truck took some convincing and a deposit to get them to order it.

This is what I worked out about the two by substituting a 7250 GVWR F150 for an HDPP which is probably at least in the same ball park:

HDPP:

+Better ride / easier steering (I promise, even though I haven't driven one....)
+Decent chunk better gas mileage
+Zippy

-Harder to find, likely a special order with deposit = less leverage
-Options are pretty limited! Play with the builder and select HDPP first, then watch as certain options deselect it...

F-250:

+Beefy / safety margin / Won't even be comparable when hauling a heavy load
+Lots of standard stuff e.g. amazing tow mirrors to begin with
+Has to have a slight edge on engine/transmission reliability in my mind
+Resale seems higher on HD trucks

-She'll be a thirsty girl
-Bear to drive in tight places due to size (But camera + mirrors mean you get every inch out of what you're given)
-May have lower incentives etc.
-Heavier steering / Needs more attention

 

As a recent owner of both (2016 F150 and now 2019 F250) I have some thoughts I can share. I was asking my self these exact questions when I was deciding which truck to purchase. I chose the F150..... but then switched to the F250.

I agree with everyone above who has made reference to the F150 being able to handle the tasks you describe. The F150 is a very capable truck.

I would say that if you wanted the most comfortable ride to go with the F150 but that isnt entirely true. There are some really nice kits out there (I have Carli PinTop 2.5 inch) which greatly improve the ride quality of the F250.

Here are the biggest differences I have noticed:

1. My F150 handled like a big SUV/Sedan where as my F250 feels very much like a truck. The ride quality and handling in the F250 is greatly improved with a quality suspension system.
2. My F150 could tow everything I needed, however it lacked the confidence that my F250 has. When towing with my F150 I was not able to sit back and relax as it was very apparent the whole time that a loaded trailer was behind me. With the new F250 I very much enjoy my towing experience as now I can sit back and relax because the trailer and load are barely even noticeable.
3. Lastly. I prefer to have a truck that can easily tow my loaded trailer with confidence and power to spare rather than a truck that has less confidence and feels like its working harder.

Can the F150 do what your asking. Absolutely, but it will put in work to do it.

The F250 will make it feel and look easy.

Just my thoughts.

 

I had a couple of 4.6 and 5.4. Complete dogs compared to today's motors. But that's irrelevant here.
Pulling the weight that he's talking about (6500, approx,) is going to get a 150 about the same fuel mileage as a 250 in my experience. Which was about 8.5 to 9. It's why I opted for a 250 a few years back. I figured if I was going to get F250 mileage, I might as well drive an F250. But my F150 was a 5.0, not an Ecoboost. I didn't read in the original post which motor he'd opt for in a 150.

 

If you dont drive a lot the F250 would work best but MPG will suck.

That would basically be my determining factor.

 

Thanks, guys. This is great information.

If I go with the F150 HDPP it'll probably be with the 3.5 Ecoboost; you lose the Max Trailer Towing package with the 5.0. The proposed full family load out could easily reach 2,000 lbs in and on the truck before hitching up the TT. Ordering up a lightly loaded XLT with the HDPP can get you roughly 2,400 lbs payload. A pretty straight forward F250 with the 6.2 will provide the same or probably better payload numbers. This is what prompted my post - what's going on behind the scenes, so to speak, when you compare an F150 to an F250 if both have 2,400 lbs payload on the yellow stickers.

F250:
Beefier brakes and a more "confident" experience are great inputs.
The Super Duty is flipping' cool.
Allowance for a bigger trailer down the road is good.
It's designed to do this kind of work.

F150-HDPP:
EB in the mountains could be a big factor.
The easier ride at home when not playing Clampetts Go Camping is big.
The baby diesel is intriguing but you are forced into trim packages that don't do a thing for me. And it's bloody expensive.
The F150 has to be specially specced to reach the minimums for the task.

The decision won't be easy.

Great stuff. Thanks again, all.
-Bob

 

If you are at 2000 in the truck before trailer get the F250 unless you need the MPG.

A 250 gas should be near 3000 lbs payload.

And it also isn't the payload to look at, the super duty has more axle capacity. More than the payload so you have some extra safety margin. The F150 is straight up payload, the axles about equal the payload.

The ecoboost is nice, ive had 2. If you can get 500lbs out of the truck and into the trailer that would be a decent choice as you said mountains and turbo is nice.

 

I think this part of our assumption is incorrect. And F250 with the 6.2 is going to have a payload over just over 3k. I think the F150 HDPP comes in around 2300. I had a conversation at one point with the owner of a HDPP, and his payload was within a few pounds of my F250 with the power stroke.

As have been said, the 250 will give you more room for growth if you ever decide to go with a bigger trailer. The 150 may have bit better mileage, being the lighter vehicle, but when towing that is not necessary a good thing.

 

F-250. Buy it once knowing it will be more than you need. Go with the F-150 and undoubtedly you'll run into a scenario that asks "maybe I should have gone with the 250 instead". And then that thought will never leave your head... You just get "more" with the F-250, in every sense of the word.

 

With that logic, you should skip the 250 and just get the 350. Thats what I did and I love the capability of my gasser. Today my surge brakes failed on the 5k boat trailer and the truck was hardly bothered. I did love my ecoboost 150 and do miss the power. The 350 better suits my uses.