this post was submitted on 21 Mar 2025
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They also explain in the video that you basically have to assume that at times the entire towing capacity load will fall on the tongue weight, like when you hit a pothole or speedbump and your trailer starts rocking back and forth a bit.
Everything might be fine and dandy when the load is more or less balanced on the trailer wheels while parked, but when driving, bumps and shit happen, and that towing tongue, back end of the vehicle, and suspension system better be able to handle it.
Any which way you look at it, the front fell off and the back fell off. All around the dumpstertruck isn't even half worth a shit compared to real work trucks.
Then the video is plain wrong in regards to tongue vs tow weight. No truck or trailer manufacturer anywhere in the world adheres to that.
I commonly tow a triple axle trailer that weighs 12,000 pounds with my GMC Sierra 2500HD. That much weight would snap the receiver off and bend the frame if the hitch had to support it all.
The CT is for clowns but that video is stupid and should be disregarded.
They went to great lengths to explain that and why a trailer load may transiently exceed it and used a 20 year old wrecked truck as a reference.
The other concern they mentioned was aluminum characteristics over time. Brand new strength will not equal strength over time. So 10k pounds is the trucks strength at its absolute best, but it will degrade over time. Also the mix of metals may cause a galvanic reaction to degrade it over time. No one else in the industry will use aluminum for the frame, for good reason
They even admit it fared better than they thought, but it's another example of Tesla ignoring engineering principles and the predicted consequences being demonstrated.
Listen, the CT is a joke and I'm not defending it. I'm pushing back on provably false information regarding towing and what to expect from a tow hitch. People get killed believing this kind of bullshit. You absolutely SHOULD NOT expect a tow hitch to be able to stand up the vehicles tow capacity rating. Ever. Even transiently.
Transiently, as in for mere moments, exceeding the 1,000lb hitch rating yes, absolutely. Expecting that the hitch will suddenly experience (and hold) the entirety of the tow capcity rating? Absolutely not. That's the exact opposite of the SAE spec. You'd also dramatically exceed the payload rating of every passenger vehicle in existence if it happened.
Better not look at the suspension of any passenger vehicle made in the last 30 years then.
The CT is unibody, it doesn't have a frame. This isn't me being pedantic either. The difference between the two is fairly important.
The CT exceeded it's rating by 8 times. Yes the Dodge 2500 did better but so what? It too was well over it's hitch and payload ratings and if you tried to drive it with that kind of weight you'd quickly crash because you couldn't steer or stop.