Vote Here - Is 12,000 Pounds "Puny" when it comes to towing?

[Gorehamj]

John Goreham
Contributing Writer, GM-Trucks.com
3-27-2019

Tesla's most recent imaginary product is its pickup truck. Tesla does not promote its products in the same fashion that many other automakers do. Instead, the company's leader takes to social media and engages directly with fans, trolls, and customers. In a recent exchange, shown above, Musk was bantering back and forth with his followers about pickup trucks. In part of the exchange, he calls a Ram truck owner's 12,000 pounds of workload being towed "puny," and makes fun of his work.  Musk, being the savvy sosh media mogul he is, didn't add any smile emojis to signal that he was kidding, so we will assume he is sincere. 

 

What say you GM-trucks.com faithful? is 12,000 pounds of steel being towed behind a work truck "puny?" If so, where do you draw the line between puny and a respectable amount of towed weight? Here's another topic for discussion. If you were considering a truck with which to tow, would you consider an EV with a 300-mile range and 20,000-pound towing rating if it cost you $100K? What would you pay?

[Unclebud87]

12000 ibs isn't puny but i used to haul that with my f250 and that really never felt like it was taxing the truck. Same thing with my old lbz duramax. 15-20k ibs you really start to notice especially if its something enclosed.

[CombsL83]

12,000 is a lot of weight. Period. Most truck owners will never tow 1/2 or even 1/4 of that. Musk has probably never towed in his life.

[mookdoc6]

12k in middle of Kansas?  12K in Colorado?  Either way 12k depending on the setup is never a cake walk........

[BIGDOGx]

Elon what product do you make that can beat it? Oh that's right you don't have one currently.

[swathdiver]

Reading those Tweets it seems like Musk is the troll.  Only the government would buy an electric truck.  Diesel/Electric, turbine/electric; now you're talking!

 

A gas turbine or diesel generator sending power to a traction motor at each wheel that can serve as brake and propulsion and manipulated for traction and stability control would be pretty cool.  My initial concern with such a propulsion system was it being too heavy but now figure the loss of brake hardware and transmission would even out with the traction motors and generator(s).

 

One cool thing is that the trailer's wheels could also have traction motors which would serve as brakes too.  Getting stuck would become far less likely and with the right programming, getting knocked over by high winds or jack-knifing would be greatly reduced too as would stopping power.

[j-ten-ner]

I find Elon's comment a little "puny".

 

so long

j-ten-ner

[ThomCannell]

As someone who has covered trucks for 20+ years... 12K was the 2500-3500 of 15 years ago and 30K only in medium-duty, CCL-only trucks. Oddest memory, 26 tons on an F-750 doing 0-60 acceleration runs with insane acceleration---26 seconds. The only true answer is, it depends.

 

[CadillacLuke24]

The only thing puny is Musk's grasp on reality. 

[Logan Lanfear]

Musk has more money than probably everyone on this page put together.  Id say he can do whatever he likes with his time.  Hes done his work.  

[j-ten-ner]

I know a few people with tons of money at hand, but they're still respectful and know how to choose their words to bring a point across.

 

so long

j-ten-ner

[SnakeEyeSS]

https://www.tesla.com/semi

 

Great specs, except The range is a joke. And how long to charge the massive batteries it must need.

Edited April 2, 2019 by SnakeEyeSS

[Chevyguy85]

https://www.tesla.com/semi
 
Great specs, except The range is a joke. And how long to charge the massive batteries it must need.

I don't think it's meant to be a long range vehicle yet. Considering there are well over 100 pre-ordered already some companies don't think the range is a joke. Makes sense for city to city runs.

Sent from my Find7 using Tapatalk

[gearheadesw]

A loaded down electric truck can go how far up hill? Then charge for 8 hours. Puny.