Thread: Towing capability V8I Auto

Have you checked your dissy vacuum advance is not stuck or is not working. That can chuck and anchor out the back.

Set the timing at idle to 10 degrees BTDC, use a timing light to make sure both the centrifugal advance and vacuum advance are working. The centrifugal advance should be lubricated by one drop of oil under the rotor button every 20,000km, many mechanics never bother and the mechanism can seize up. The vacuum advance is easy enough to change, available at various places including ebay UK.

Originally Posted by Roverlord off road spares

Have you checked your dissy vacuum advance is not stuck or is not working. That can chuck and anchor out the back.

Roverlord, I have a freelander diesel that accelerates up hill with little effort. On the old Disco the vacaum advance works first thing I replaced when I bought it and have upgrade to Bosch ignition, I just dont flog it uphill to save a little fuel its not that bad when you give it some right foot, one thing I have learnt is dont be in a hurry in and old Disco, I just like imput regards towing.

bee utey timing is 9 degrees BTDC both centrifugal and vacuum advance work, it goes like a scalded cat if I stike the right foot into it but compared to a diesel it lacks torque just like to know how it would go with 2000 extra kgs behind it especially the auto box.

Sparky

13 litres per 100km is about as good as you can expect. But the 320 odd Nm is what you feel when you hit a hill. It's not much.

Originally Posted by Dougal

13 litres per 100km is about as good as you can expect. But the 320 odd Nm is what you feel when you hit a hill. It's not much.

Dougal
Thats what i am thinking, 320 NM is what worries me, unloaded it goes quiet well but with an extra 2000 kg how gutless is the old 3.9 motor, any one towed a van for a prolonged period with 2000 kg behind, when I state uphill its the long climbs that slowly erode your speed, couple of big pulls from Newcastle to Sydney that worry me. You cant make Strawberry Jam from s#$t, but I still love the old Disco.

Sparky

My only experience with this was with a D2 V8, so the 4L (3.9 plus a tiny bit).
I towed a heavy duty vehicle trailer (probably about 500kg) with another V8 discovery 1 3.9 on it, so around 2200kg of car.
It did incredibly well, I actually kept the speed down at 100kph and it was happy to go faster.
No heating issues, this was from past Kapunda back to Tea Tree Gully, about 80km or so.
Major hill here is coming up from main north road on the grove way and this was the time it did give a bit of a winge. We slowed down and topped out at about 50km I think it was, she just didn't want to go any higher heading up there with that load.

Originally Posted by steve_a

My only experience with this was with a D2 V8, so the 4L (3.9 plus a tiny bit).
I towed a heavy duty vehicle trailer (probably about 500kg) with another V8 discovery 1 3.9 on it, so around 2200kg of car.
It did incredibly well, I actually kept the speed down at 100kph and it was happy to go faster.

No heating issues, this was from past Kapunda back to Tea Tree Gully, about 80km or so.
Major hill here is coming up from main north road on the grove way and this was the time it did give a bit of a winge. We slowed down and topped out at about 50km I think it was, she just didn't want to go any higher heading up there with that load.

IIRC the 3.9 and 4.0 are actual the same CCs. The size change was to identify the new model