We tow a Brinkley Model Z 3515 fifth wheel with a Ford F-350 dually, and we do it a lot. Full-time RV life means a travel day every week or two, sometimes more, and every one of those days starts with hitching up and ends with getting the rig level and stable at a new site.
When we started, neither of us had ever towed anything this big. Nathan grew up in Michigan around trucks but not fifth wheels, and Fabiola is from Brazil, where a 43-foot trailer behind a pickup is not a common sight. So everything on this list got figured out the hard way, on camera, for our YouTube channel Nomads Amor. Our very first hitching attempt is a whole video if you want to see how shaky we were.
This is the gear that survived that learning curve. It rides in the truck bed or the basement on every travel day.
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The hitch setup
GEN-Y Executive Torsion-Flex SnapLatch hitch
Instead of a traditional fifth wheel hitch, we run the GEN-Y GH-8045AL Executive Torsion-Flex, which converts the fifth wheel pin to a gooseneck connection in the truck bed. The torsion-flex head absorbs a lot of the chucking and bucking you'd otherwise feel over rough pavement, and the SnapLatch coupler locks onto the ball without us having to line things up perfectly.
The first time we hooked it up without the dealer's help was nerve-wracking, and we filmed the whole thing in our first hauling video. Now it's routine. Back under the pin, listen for the latch, tug test, done. The other thing we like: with the hitch out of the truck, the bed is almost completely open again. You can find the hitch on Amazon.
One small tip from experience: the ball sits in the bed even when the trailer is off, and it is exactly head height when you lean in to grab something. A pool noodle over the gooseneck saves your skull. Ask us how we know.
GEN-Y GoosePuck 5" offset ball
The hitch needs a ball, and ours is the GEN-Y GH-21001 GoosePuck, a 5-inch offset ball that drops into the factory puck system in the F-350 bed. The offset moves the connection point forward, which gives the trailer cap more clearance to the cab in tight turns. Our Brinkley's spec sheet puts the hitch weight around 2,500 pounds, and the GoosePuck setup has handled it without complaint. It's on Amazon here.
One thing we'll add for anyone new to towing heavy: get your rig weighed. We ran ours across a CAT scale on a travel day (that video is here) and then sat down over dinner to break down the numbers, including a rough estimate of how much water weight we were hauling. One pass over a truck stop scale tells you whether your pin weight and axle weights are actually where they should be.
Unhitched and stable
Camco Eaz-Lift gooseneck stabilizer tripod
Fifth wheels can feel bouncy up front when you walk around inside, since the whole nose is sitting on two landing gear legs. The Camco Eaz-Lift tripod is a folding jack that snugs up under the kingpin area and takes the wobble out. Setup takes maybe two minutes, and it packs down small enough to live in the basement. It made a noticeable difference in our rig, especially in the bedroom, which sits right over the pin box. It's on Amazon.
RV SnapPads
SnapPads are permanent rubber feet that snap onto the landing gear and leveling jacks, so you never have to throw pads under them again. Before these, we carried a stack of blocks and placed one under each jack at every site, and forgetting one meant metal feet sinking into soft ground. Now the pads are just always there.
We got ours through the RV SnapPad site, and the code NOMADSAMOR gets you a discount at checkout.
X-Chock wheel stabilizers
X-Chocks expand between the tandem tires and clamp the wheels against each other, which kills most of the side-to-side rocking inside the trailer. We put them in as part of our arrival routine every single time, right after the auto-level runs. Fair warning from one of our travel days: if the trailer settles overnight they can bind up, and we once spent a comical amount of time getting un-chocked before a weigh-in. Loosen them before you retract the jacks and you'll be fine. They're on Amazon.
MaxxHaul solid rubber wheel chocks
X-Chocks are stabilizers, not real chocks, so we also carry MaxxHaul solid rubber chocks that go in front of and behind the tires before we ever unhitch. They're heavy, they don't slide on wet pavement, and they were cheap. This is the one piece of gear on this list we hope never has to prove itself. Find them on Amazon.
Tri-Lynx leveling blocks
Even with auto-leveling, we still use Tri-Lynx blocks constantly. They stack like big Lego bricks under a low tire on a sloped site, go under the tongue jack of anything we're helping a neighbor with, and fill in when a jack needs more reach than it has. Ten blocks in a bag, made in the USA, and ours are scuffed up from regular use with no cracks so far. They're on Amazon.
Travel day maintenance
LockNLube grease gun and Lucas Red N Tacky
A gooseneck ball and a moving pin box need grease, and so do the suspension zerks under the trailer. The LockNLube gun has a coupler that locks onto the fitting instead of popping off and spraying grease on your hands, which is worth it all by itself. We load it with Lucas Red N Tacky, which stays put through rain and heat. We walked through our whole undercarriage routine, mistakes included, in this maintenance video. The gun is on Amazon here and the grease is here.
W160 jump starter with air compressor
This one lives in the truck full-time. It's a 5000-amp jump pack that can start the F-350's diesel, and it doubles as a small air compressor for topping off a car tire or an inflatable. When you live in your vehicle, a dead battery in the middle of nowhere is a bigger problem than it is at home, so we treat this as cheap insurance. It's on Amazon.
VIAIR 400P portable compressor
The W160's little pump is not going to keep up with dually and trailer tires at highway pressures, so we also carry the VIAIR 400P. It hooks to the truck battery, and it has enough flow to bring all ten tires (six truck, four trailer) up to pressure without overheating. We used it in that same undercarriage maintenance video and it has become part of the pre-travel-day checklist. You can grab it on Amazon.
ETENWOLF T300 tire pressure gauge
A cheap stick gauge and a TPMS reading can disagree by several psi, and at trailer weights that matters. The T300 is a digital gauge rated to plus or minus half a percent, it reads up to 200 psi, and the batteries are replaceable instead of the whole gauge being disposable. We check every tire with it before rolling. It's on Amazon.
Everything in one place
All of the Amazon items above are collected in our Truck & Hitching idea list, and the rest of our gear is on our Amazon storefront.
If you're building out a full-time setup, our main gear list covers the whole rig, and we have separate write-ups on our water filtration setup and our solar and battery system.
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