2026 HeartlandBighorn 31RL

The 31RL is where Bighorn starts, and it starts with the full architecture: a rear living room opened by three slides, a front bedroom over the pin, 8-foot-6 main ceilings inside the 102-inch wide-body, and two power awnings (16 and 10 feet) outside. On the 10 July 2026 probe it was the second-most-listed plan in the line, behind only the 38RE.

The build is the shared Bighorn platform: a 12-inch steel I-beam frame with the drop-frame design, CoreShield 2-inch laminated walls, a painted fiberglass front cap with clearcoat and LED lighting, frameless windows, the TrussXL truss under a limited-lifetime roof membrane, and the ThermaShield zero-degree-tested package — 40,000-BTU furnace, double-layer fiberglass batt insulation, fully enclosed heated ducted underbelly, 2-inch block foam with reflective foil. Two 15,000-BTU Whisper Quiet air conditioners, a tankless water heater and the mandatory Premium Package — six-point hydraulic auto-leveling, the GE 21-cubic-foot residential refrigerator with an 1,800-watt inverter, GE convection microwave with air fryer, GE Profile range, central vacuum, fireplace, MORryde steps — are on every unit. The printed 16,000-pound GVWR equals 13,060 dry plus 2,940 cargo exactly, on tandem 7,000-pound axles — the one plan in the line on 7,000s rather than 8,000s.

At a 2,405-pound dry pin, the 31RL is the one Bighorn that a properly configured three-quarter-ton can plausibly carry — loaded pins run higher, so weigh the coach and check the truck’s payload placard, not its tow rating. The 3,000-pound-rated rear tow hitch with a four-way pin connector is standard here as across the line (except the 40DB). Buyers wanting the kitchen aft should read the 36RK; families should start at the 37MD or 40DB.

Heartland's Bighorn line — the flagship luxury fifth wheel of the relaunched range: seven 2026 floorplans, every one a 102-inch wide-body on a 12-inch steel I-beam drop frame with a painted fiberglass front cap, CoreShield laminated sidewalls in high-gloss gel coat, the ThermaShield zero-degree package with a 40,000-BTU furnace, two 15,000-BTU Whisper Quiet air conditioners, and a mandatory Premium Package that includes six-point hydraulic auto-leveling, a GE 21-cubic-foot residential refrigerator with an 1,800-watt inverter and a GE appliance suite. All seven plans are profiled in depth on the Bighorn hub with verified weights.

This floorplan carries its water comfortably. A full 75-gallon fresh tank is roughly 21% of the 2,940-pound cargo capacity, leaving the Bighorn 31RL with a usable gear budget even when you tow full.

The published dry pin weight of 2,405 pounds is 18% of this floorplan’s 13,060-pound dry weight. Fifth-wheel pin weight rides in the bed of the truck, so it comes off payload rather than off tow rating — and it rises with the trailer as you load it, not in proportion to what you put over the axles.

Nothing above changes the ceiling. Loaded to its 16,000-pound GVWR the Bighorn 31RL is towing 2,940 pounds more than its 13,060-pound dry figure, and that is the number your vehicle has to be rated for — not the brochure weight.

Tank balance is generous here: 75 gallons of fresh against 87 grey and 50 black, so waste capacity keeps pace with supply and the fresh tank is the constraint that ends a dry stay.

Of the 7 Bighorn floorplans profiled here, the Bighorn 31RL is the lightest by GVWR at 16,000 pounds — the entry point to the line and the one most likely to suit a vehicle already at its limit.

Either side of it in the same line: Bighorn 36RK is 1,300 pounds heavier at 17,300 lb GVWR.

Against the Bighorn 31RL: the Paradigm 295MK is 3 ft shorter; the Avenue 38DBL is 5 lb lighter and 6 ft longer and sleeps 1 more. Those are differences in the published numbers only — what they cost, how they are built and how they live are separate questions each of those pages answers on its own terms.

Those are the nearest fifth wheels from other lines by weight — one per line, picked by proximity on that figure and nothing else. They are listed so the same tow vehicle can be checked against real alternatives, not because they are equivalent inside; layout, build and price diverge sharply across that group.

For scale, the Bighorn floorplans profiled here run 13,060 to 16,110 pounds dry and 36 to 44 feet of exterior length across 7 plans. Where a floorplan falls in that spread usually says more about which vehicle can tow it, and which site it fits, than the layout name does.

Every profiled floorplan in this line, with the full weight table, is on the Bighorn line hub.

This catalog tracks 18 specification fields per floorplan. Named sources publish 16 of them for the Bighorn 31RL. The rest are not shown, because the alternative is reading a figure across from a sibling floorplan or from what the segment usually does — and a number nobody published is worth less than an admitted gap.

Not published for this floorplan: slide count, awning. If you find one of these in a manufacturer document for this plan, it belongs on this page.

The completeness figure at the foot of this page (95%) measures the same thing on the full field set: it is a measurement of how much this floorplan’s manufacturer publishes, not of how much research went into the page.

How every figure here was sourced and checked is set out on the methodology page.