Hi my name is Steve , I am an English guy and live in Sw France for the last 8 years. I run my own business where I rent out and operate a 58 foot tracked cherry picker doing all sorts of work at height . The trailer and the machine weigh a total of 6200 lbs on a trailer with a gross weight of 7700 lbs (the maximum allowable in europe without using an actual truck)

I currently tow (don't laugh) with an Audi Q7 4.2 tdi , this car has been brilliant, 340 bhp and 590 lb ft of torque the max gross weight of the car and trailer can be up to 14,400 lbs and I run at 12,350. Sadly the Audi is now 14 years old and starting to go wrong so I want to change to a less complicated vehicle (No dpf , no air suspension , no adaptive headlights , all of which have/ are going wrong with the Audi.)

Now come the hard part....registering American trucks in France is a difficult, time consuming and expensive thing to do , read 6-8 months and easily 10,000 dollars by the time import taxes , registration test costs and the actual reg document tax are included. That said the French (and I ) love these trucks and they continue to be imported and sold . BUT the 1500's are common the 2500's are like unicorns and the 3500 unregisterable (maybe as an actual truck but not a regular vehicle)

I would really like a 3rd Gen 2500 but there are none correctly registered in France for sale at the moment, there was one an 03 Hemi 2500 quad cab but the guy took down the advert and won't tell me if he sold it.

​Sorry for the waffle , but my question is should I wait for another 2500 or can an upgraded 1500 do the job , bearing in mind it will be towing everytime I drive it doing about 20,000 miles a year.

One last thing the european trailers are set up very differently regarding tongue weight , mine only puts 265 lbs on the hitch and tows perfectly up to "cough" 70 mph

 

Hi Steve. Welcome to DF.

Looks like a 1500, even a shortbed.... will haul your cherry picker, but, it will just about be maxed out..... If you can, hold out for the unicorn.... if you can't, buy what'll work, and keep lookin' for the unicorn.

 

Don't overload the box or tongue and you'll be fine for quite sometime. I did on my '03 Off Road, paid the price of an expensive tow and an axle bearing replacement. Buy a trailer package equipped truck. Transmission and 9.25 AAM rear end are the only 'weak' points. The extra cooling of the trailer package seems a must, especially short distance in city hauling.
For rear differential, the three I've opened in junkyards all had metal clutch parts stuck to the magnet in the case.
What is a decent Gen III delivered to Galveston, TX or the East Coast bound for Belgium worth? Asking for a friend.

 

Thanks for the info. Rams in Belgium seem to be very different to France , plenty of 2500's though all seem to have high mileages like they are used as work trucks there.
Was thinking of adding a finned trans pan , trans temp gauge , and a 1 ton trans cooler along with Amsoil trans fluid to try and help keep the trans alive

 

I looked at this once. For my '03 Hemi half-ton heavy duty cooler was the same 1500 or 3500. If you get one for a diesel or V-10, they looked a little bigger maybe, but had fluid line configuration differences.
Pick France then. I only chose Belgique because I had a friend who hauls cars tell me autos shipped from TX or GA were fairly reasonable and it's right next door. In America we think Europe/EU is just one happy little place.