Discovery off road towing

It all probablly depends on what is termed off road. Off road would generally mean any place that is a non gazetted road, so this infact could include any private property including a suburban back yard or shopping centre car park.
What a lot of manufacturers are refering to their products no as is dirt road capable rather than off road.
I would say by the letter of the law as long as you are on a gazetted road or track you should be safe for insurance unless your policy specifically say "off sealed roads" which can happen and is often in hire car agreements.
If 1 tonne was the case on tracks then nearly all caravans and off road vans would be breaking the law often.

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Originally Posted by p38arover

I've never heard of a legal limit on off-road tow weights. Where did you see that?

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Its in the Hand book under general data for my 90, and I think all LRs have this reduced limit for off road. I believe recently they have upped the offroad to 1500kg

Maximum on road 3500kg
Maximum off road 1000kg

The key is what 'off road' means

So it's not written up as a law which is how I read Tombie's post.

I would take that to mean anywhere you'd use Low Range or Terrain Response. It is a recommendation not a fixed limit.

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Originally Posted by p38arover

So it's not written up as a law which is how I read Tombie's post.

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If it's written in the handbook as 1 tonne as far as insurance companys are concerned it's the law. Pat

Pats view would also be mine.

It's not that clear cut.

Firstly, "offroad" is undefined and if ever there's a term to argue about, it's the definition of offroad.

Secondly, towing 1000kg offroad needs to directly contribute to the incident at fault. What that means if that if a tree fell on your car while towing 1001kg offroad you'd be fine.

I would be more concerned about operating with due care and attention which would stand up to reasonable scrutiny, for example attempting to descent a very long, steep, slippery track with 990kg on the back is technically within limits but not exactly advisable.

I agree that the point that needs clarifying is what the definition of off road is, which I put in my earlier post.

Interesting exercise.
Just checked SWMBO's D2 manual and sure enough 3500Kg on road and 1000Kg off road (braked trailer).
What's off road mean? I reckon the insurance companys will take it to mean gazetted road, which is reasonable. I followed the telegraph track up the cape in '78 and don't know if this would qualify, but I'm told that there's a new road up there now and I suppose this would qualify. The original track was a PMG (Telstra) maintenance track back then.
Does this mean if I stack the D2 with the loaded horse float coming up my drive that it is not covered?
A call to your insurance company is in order if this is a concern for you.
As for Pat Callinan, never heard of the bugger till last Sunday when I watched his CSR program. Overall I thought the content and presentation was OK if a bit simplistic, but when you consider his target audience have no idea about outback travel it was a good starting point. But the ads, talk about selling your soul to the devil, that wizzy Pat Callinan logo every couple of minutes and the continual sucking to ARB was bad enough.
For me the total destruction of his credibility was the ongoing promo of his Nissan ST Patrol with probably the worst and most unreliable engine ever to be installed in a 4WD in the known universe (understatement), his endorsement of Pirelli Scorpions coming a close second.

Deano.

Agree with you entirely about the show DeanoH.
It appears that off road is going to mean whatever the insurance company wants it to mean, but I am sure, given insurance companies' track records whether the trailer contributed to an accident or not it would still deem it to be an invalid claim