Driving from FL to MA in April

I will be heading from Bradenton, FL to Worcester, MA the third week in April. 

I'm going to be driving back in a 2nd gen short bed Ram 1500. I'm not yet sure how much space I'll have, but may be able to help move some stuff north for some GRMers.

My plan will be to leave FL on the 21/22 and be in Mass by Saturday. 
 

Got room for a 95 Mitsubishi Chariot? 

In reply to Mazdax605 :

I'm flying down to FL and driving the Ram back to Mass. 

I wasn't planning on a trailer, so only if it fits in the bed of the truck.

No Time said:

In reply to Mazdax605 :

I'm flying down to FL and driving the Ram back to Mass. 

I wasn't planning on a trailer, so only if it fits in the bed of the truck.

Probably not. Lol. I was looking at flying down and driving back, but we can only go during April school vacation and the flights are expensive. Now we're looking to drive down and back, but I might just get the car shipped up here, but that's not cheap either. 

In reply to Mazdax605 :

Thats why I'm heading down the week before. I did some searching and by leaving the Wednesday before school vacation I was able to get 2 one way ticket on southwest for $115. 

We're just going to take advantage of the remote school/work the end of that week. 

Stampie?  Dusterbd?  Other folks?  Got anything cool for me to buy?  My paypal finger is itchy.

Curtis73 (Forum Supporter) said:

Stampie?  Dusterbd?  Other folks?  Got anything cool for me to buy?  My paypal finger is itchy.

If you buy my trailer, or Svrex's, then he can hook up to that, and move more stuff!

In reply to 03Panther :

Thought about that.... then thought about short wheelbase 1/2 ton.  Might be an interesting trip.

In reply to Curtis73 (Forum Supporter) :

I did tow it with my wife’s F150 4wd eco boost to VA and back. And being 4wd, that truck was not the most stable tow rig. Did great though. Only 11 mpg, empty or full of Dad’s garage, but that’s one of the eco boosts problems. Lots of power, but if you dare to use it, it’s thirsty!

mostly joking, anyway. 

Now, back to your regularly scheduled forum...

I haven't seen what trailers you are talking about, but based on Curtis post looking for a trailer, I'm guessing they are bigger than the truck. 

The club cab helps offset the short bed and it is equipped with air bags and a brake controller, but still a 23 year old half ton with a 318 and auto. 

My original plan was to find a challenge project outside of the rust belt to tow back, and  Uhaul was $300 one way for a trailer.

Some things have changed and my son just fractured his clavicle playing hockey, so it wouldn't be a lot of father-son work before he heads off to camp for the summer. Rather than get something now, I will probably wait until next spring to shop for a post HS graduation project for the challenge and then use as a drift car unless I find a deal that I can't pass up. 

I made the drive from Tampa to PGH in a 1995 Cherokee, fully expecting lots of roadside repairs and funny stories of being stranded. Damn thing ran like a charm at 75mph all the way home with no issues.

In reply to pinchvalve (Forum Supporter) :

This should be a low risk fly and drive. The truck had been my fathers daily driver and tow vehicle  until earlier this year so I'm hoping for an uneventful trip. 

No Time said:

I haven't seen what trailers you are talking about, but based on Curtis post looking for a trailer, I'm guessing they are bigger than the truck. 

The club cab helps offset the short bed and it is equipped with air bags and a brake controller, but still a 23 year old half ton with a 318 and auto. 

That's what I'm thinking.  If it were me, I'd do it because I'm dumb and I tow big things all the time.  Not sure if I would feel comfy asking someone to be as dumb as me.

I've done (and still do) plenty of dumb stuff, so you are not alone.

 l have learned lessons over the years, and as I've gotten older I try to restrict myself to doing dumb stuff with things I own. I'd feel bad about breaking some else's car/trailer/tool and feel obligated to replace/repair anything I damaged, so I limit my risk/exposure to what I can comfortably afford.

As a result, I can relate to your hesitation and I would have similar hesitation about pulling someone else's trailer if it would be a risky situation.   

But I could definitely help shuttle parts, etc for GRM members during the return trip. 

Since we've followed my partial joke with Curtis into a hijack...

I did tow all over the country with my 99 standard cab Dodge 1500 w/5.2 (318)  without any feel of having too much trailer for the chassis. The engine had enough power as well. That was an airstream I was pulling at the time, so good aero, but a lot of weight. The trans in you truck would be my only concern. I had two trans coolers, fans, remoter filter w/temp.gauge, and synthetic fluid, to help ease that concern. If a brake controller has been added, I would imagine some cooling has been as well.

I would not see anything risky about towing with that rig... other than "normal" stuff that happens.

Svrex has (what i think) is the best bang for the buck for Curtis, and as long as ya didn't load 'er to the gills, I see no worries. ( of course, same for my trailer!)

Just my $0.02, and might or might not be worth the deep discount I charge for it!

Just bumping this since I will be making the return trip for FL to MA in about 1 1/2 weeks. 

So we're traveling back from Central Florida to MA in the next day or so. However, we want to make a couple of stops along the way. One of the places is Japanese classics jdm car dealership in Richmond VA. Of course they only allow public to check out the inventory after 3 pm. Waze tells me that if we leave by 3 AM tomorrow morning then we'll arrive around 2 pm. From there we want to go through the Chesapeake bay tunnel Bridge and then possibly a stop on the jersey shore. Obviously this is not a great route, and will most likely lead to much traffic. Is there a way with waze to map this out as steps? I'm new to waze and I can't figure it out. 

Waze kinda sucks with multiple stops, atleast last time I tried.  I usually use the app/website furkot (https://trips.furkot.com/) to plan multiple day trips.  It takes a little bit to learn it but it allows you to setup the entire timeline of the trip, and it gives you more control than waze (like increasing or decreasing average speed, adding breaks,  planning fuel stops). 

I found it easier to figure out how to use it on an actual computer, but once you have a trip planned you can pull it up in the app and click on any stop to get the address sent to waze for navigation.

I'm on Google maps daily, often by phone. 

First you put in 2 addresses. To add another address, first hit the 3 dots symbol (often called a hamburger) and that will give you the choice to Add Stop. 

The next screen shot then shows with the 3rd stop added.  Easily you can add a 4th stop of more.  Touch, hold and drag and you can easily change the order of the stops.  Hitting the x removes that stop.  

Here is an example with more stops. 

The way I do it in Waze is to put in the last stop, route it, then add a stop. Waze inserts the new stop in the middle.

I haven't found a way to change the order of the stops in Waze, but that could be just me missing something. 

JDM classics looks cool, where did you find the hours for public access? 

Im leaving Bradenton tomorrow morning to head back to Mass and may try to stop there if they are open.