BA Falcon Wagon Towing

I've got a 1600kg tow pack on my car.

Now, I may have to possibly tow a car back from Canberra, which weighs 1300kg's + the weight of the trailer.

Would I be right to put around 2 tonne on the bar? Or not.

It's a hayman and reece hitch type towbar..

Any precautions I should take if it's ok to be done?

Cheers,
Ben

[Kev_BLNXR8_Ute]

Originally Posted by Ben Nurmi

I've got a 1600kg tow pack on my car.

Now, I may have to possibly tow a car back from Canberra, which weighs 1300kg's + the weight of the trailer.

Would I be right to put around 2 tonne on the bar? Or not.

It's a hayman and reece hitch type towbar..

Any precautions I should take if it's ok to be done?

Cheers,
Ben

Hmmm well you shouldnt go over the specified load rating.

A manual is only ment to tow 1600 so I'm told. Auto can tow 2500.

However I know from my own experiance that my manual ute with a 1600 kg tow pack pulled about 2400.
I didnt realise just how heavy it all was at the time. I had a hyaundi on a bp hire trailer. I figured about 1300 for car and a couple hundred for trailer.
I later found out that the trailer was 1250. Shocked the hell out of me.
Everything survived fine but if something was to have gone wrong I dont know where my car insurance would stand....

Cheers Kev

It's an auto, and it's a wagon, so it shouldn't have any issues pulling load.

[M14A-Mclaren]

Originally Posted by Kev_xr8_ute

Hmmm well you shouldnt go over the specified load rating.

A manual is only ment to tow 1600 so I'm told. Auto can tow 2500.

However I know from my own experiance that my manual ute with a 1600 kg tow pack pulled about 2400.
I didnt realise just how heavy it all was at the time. I had a hyaundi on a bp hire trailer. I figured about 1300 for car and a couple hundred for trailer.
I later found out that the trailer was 1250. Shocked the hell out of me.
Everything survived fine but if something was to have gone wrong I dont know where my car insurance would stand....

Cheers Kev

A trailer that weighs 1.25 ton? jeeesus, my dad picked one up from the tip for $10 did it up got rid of rust re did wood wiring on the lights and painted it and we used to for the Quad when we had it and the trailer was really like so easy to push around. My dad recently sold the trailer for $750, hows that for profit!

[Mechan1k]

We have a double-axle car trailer ... with caging around it ... and it's heavier than I thought.

I have the 1600kg towing hitch on the AU ute (I also have the 2300kg heavy duty kit on the Territory as well.

I found towing the car trailer full of rubbish (not as heavy as a car) ... the combined weight of trailer and rubbish was 1900kg (found this out on the weighbridge afterwards).

More than I was supposed to tow ... the main thing I found was trying to slow down ... seeing as I didn't have the electric brake booster installed.

Also ... to tow the full 1600kg capacity you will need to electric brake booster box fitted to your car as well (and wiring into your towing harness) ... this is a necessity ... otherwise ... maximum unbraked towing capacity is about 750kg ... by law from memory.

I wouldn't be pulling a car trailer with car on it with a 1600kg towing kit ... that's for sure.

And I wouldn't be doing more than 80km/h either (with the correct towing kit on).

Just my thoughts and advice.

PS: I tow 2 and 3 berth horsefloats all the time (majority of the time full as well) in the Territory ... so i do a fair bot of heavy towing ... just letting you know from experience.

Cheers

[GreenMachine]

One of those box type Hayman Reece jobbies will do it easy. The problem will be stopping it. Use the gears first, then when they're not slowing you enough, use the brakes. I towed many car trailers (with cars, 2200+ kg's) with an AU wagon, and found that it didn't take much downhill work for the brakes to fade.

Also brake early where possible - getting hard on the anchors and finding that your 2-tonne car trailer is steering YOU is not a fun experience. Well-adjusted electric brakes are a great thing to have. Note the *well adjusted* in that sentence - the last hire trailer I had with electric brakes locked up the trailer every time I feathered the pedal - not cool!

I don't know where you are, but "back from Canberra" suggests it might be a fair way. Don't count on averaging much over 90kph with a loaded car trailer.

Also, ensure that the trailer has 4 matching tyres and they're all at the correct PSI - Several forums members can testify as to how scary my last car trailer adventure was - a P6 LTD wreck on a borrowed trailer with 3 x 14 inch tyres and 1 x 13 inch tyre. One of which was shedding chunks of tread the whole 3 hour trip, and blew about 2 k's from the destination. At 80kph, the trailer was swinging around behind the car like a fish on a line. Not recommended.

Also, ensure that the car is loaded STRAIGHT on the trailer, with the heavy end to the front (the heavy end might be the rear, in an engineless LTD with a 9" diff, for example). Having the car straight will make the trailer tow a bit easier, and having the weight over the towball keeps your back wheels firmly planted on the tarmac.

Remember the legal aspect, in that you will more than likely be exceeding your car's rated towing capacity. Also, if your gearbox blows whilst doing this, don't tell Ford!

[bscampbell]

I remember reading 'towing tips' in the cars user manual.
I'm pretty sure it said to have it in 'sports' mode.
Pull the manual out and have a look for yourself!

Originally Posted by bscampbell

I remember reading 'towing tips' in the cars user manual.
I'm pretty sure it said to have it in 'sports' mode.
Pull the manual out and have a look for yourself!

Exactly. When towing with an auto you don't want it going into overdrive.




As for the question, yes it will do it, but legally you can't exceed the rated tow weight.
As for the rest of the suggestions, they are spot on, although I'd add, be carefull about hiring from a petrol station, they are rarely maintained well, let alone at all..