Towing V6 Petrol. Poptop vs Hardtop

[davemc]

Hello,

Searched around could not find exactly what I wanted to know so thought ask.

We are looking at a caravan comes in hardtop and poptop 18" only around 1500 kgs. Avan model.
Wondering what it will do to Fuel economy in the real world.
We have a V6 Petrol so will it be 5-10% more for hardtop?
Some people say no difference really for newer vans.

What are you guys getting towing with a Petrol V6 compared to normal.
City we get around 19's highway 12-13's
I assume towing highway I get around 18-19 with the V6. So if hardtop is another 10-20% it will hurt more :)

[ytt105]

Probably not a lot of difference.
Poptop will probably be a bit heavier than the full height, (frame strengthening weighs more than wall sheeting), full height is a little bit better in insulation, full height has a better toilet/shower setup, poptop lets you get into off road places better, but the best thing about poptop is all the extra space above the cupboards that you can put oversized stuff on when setup. Eg, when the grandkids come with us they have a duffle bag full of clothes, used to be two but I've trained mum a little, it can be put above the cupboards and got down with ease. Its far too big to go into one of the extra cupboards.
Another possible problem with poptops is, if there is an air-con unit on the roof they can be quite heavy to lift. One we tried was too heavy for SWMBO to lift.
Get either, forget about the fuel cost and just get out there.

[davemc]

thanks ytt105.. yes when we got the Disco the wife does not reset the counter so we cannot see how much fuel :) The mini I have balances things out.

More interested what people getting towing and seeing the Disco higher then a Falcon or the like if they have probs with full vans vs pop tops.
Also interested real world fuel so I can get ready for the shock :eek:

[Scary]

thanks ytt105.. yes when we got the Disco the wife does not reset the counter so we cannot see how much fuel :) The mini I have balances things out.

More interested what people getting towing and seeing the Disco higher then a Falcon or the like if they have probs with full vans vs pop tops.
Also interested real world fuel so I can get ready for the shock :eek:

We just did ~2800km in the last 2 weeks towing our camper trailer.

Inclusive of maybe 150km of off road sand driving I got 19.6 for the whole trip.

Highway on the way up to coral Bay was 17.2

Taking it on the sand took it up to 20.1

Back home brought it back to the 19.6.

Wind made a big difference on the way home as it would lose speed in top gear so it was kept in 5th for most of the way - that and we were going home so the speed increased a bit.