Bought a used Ram 1500 crew cab off harbert's to haul my bagger

not getting soft, getting smart. i trailered my street glide for years before my knees made the decision for me. showing up to a rally with a fresh bike and a fresh back is worth every mile you dont ride, and half the guys judging you in the parking lot hauled in too, they just wont say it.

the half ton is plenty for a single bagger on an open trailer. you only really need a 3/4 ton once you go enclosed and start loading two bikes plus all the gear. good call on the hemi with the 3.92, that gear and the tow package is the combo you want. a buddy of mine found his tow rig in the same harbert's used truck inventory, a Tundra he pulls a boat with, and hes been happy. seems like they move a lot of clean lease returns.

moving this to Garage & Gear since its half truck talk now, leaving a redirect in the sturgis planning thread.

good writeup Dale. one thing for anybody new to trailering a bagger. get a proper wheel chock bolted to the trailer floor and run soft ties over the bars, not ratchet straps cranked straight onto your triple trees. you can bend a fork tube or crack a fairing bracket a lot easier than people think. compress the front end maybe a third, no more, and re check your tie downs at the first fuel stop because they always settle in the first hour.

i bought a truck off that dealership myself a couple years back and the experience lined up with what youre describing. clean title, no runaround. run it.

kinda hijacking but this is exactly what im wrestling with. just got my first bagger, a used Heritage, and i want to take it to a rally next summer but the idea of riding it 900 miles green as i am scares me more than the rally does.

is a half ton really enough? everybody at my dealership tried to sell me a 3/4 ton diesel and it felt like a lot of truck for one motorcycle. and honestly i dont have new truck money. where would a broke first year rider even start looking for something that can tow without being a project?

local here, i live 20 minutes from main street in sturgis. every august i watch a thousand of you roll in absolutely destroyed from the ride and then try to party on top of it. trailer the bike, ride the hills fresh, your whole rally gets better. no shame in it, plenty of the bikes at the rally came in on a trailer, people just dont admit it standing in the parking lot.

nice truck too. i grabbed my last ranch truck off harbertsautosales.com after a neighbor did the same, its held up hauling hay and a bike trailer both. if you ever want back roads out here that skip the rally traffic hit me up.

my husband and i ride two up on a Road Glide and we trailer to anything over about 500 miles now. the blue ridge and the dragon are our backyard so we ride the fun stuff and haul the boring interstate slog. zero regrets. welcome to the dark side Dale.

heat and humidity down here on the gulf coast makes a long summer ride miserable so ive trailered for years. one thing nobody has mentioned yet, if you go with an enclosed trailer throw a cheap moisture absorbing bag inside. salt air and a sweaty bike sitting closed up overnight will surface rust your chrome and your rotors quick, learned that the hard way on a set of ape hangers.

been meaning to replace my old tow rig actually. the harbert's lot has a couple crew cabs listed right now that im eyeballing. good to hear the buying part went smooth, thats usually my worry buying a truck i cant kick the tires on in person first.

i work nights so i do most of my hauling at weird hours and having a truck that just starts and goes matters more to me than badges. picked up a used crew cab off harbertsautosales.com last spring for basically the same reason as Dale, needed something to pull the bike trailer and my little fishing boat without adding a car payment on top of everything.

question for the group while were on it. whats everybody using for a ramp? my back is done lifting a 900 pound bagger up a folding aluminum ramp, im thinking about one of those arched loading ramps or just going to a lower deck trailer.

shop owner and mod here, i load customer baggers all day. paulo, get an arched ramp. the straight ones bottom out the floorboards and the exhaust on anything lowered, and a Heritage or a Glide sits low enough to catch. even better, walk the bike up with the engine off and a helper steadying the bars, or mount a cheap winch on the trailer and let it do the pulling. ive patched up way more guys hurt loading a bike than i have from riding one.

on the truck side ill just say this from behind the lift. the lease return half tons coming off dealers like the one Dale bought from are usually the cleanest used trucks we see, fleet maintained and not beat on. a 3.92 hemi with the tow package is a good honest tow rig for a single bagger. no complaints from me.