Thread: Confused - D3/D4/RRS Towball Weight

Actually Dougal I don't believe that your 100% correct, stiffness of suspension can make a real difference when towing, when I first had new Koni shocks fitted to the D3 it towed our van incredibly well at any speed even on tight and twisty country roads.

But it would seem the shocks were doing most of the work and within about 6 thousand kilometres all four shocks were stuffed and leaking. Koni has since replaced them with a new batch that has different dampening and they are far more compliant. With the first set there was no body roll with either a van on the back or not while cornering, now the D3 with the new shocks has plenty of body roll and doesn't handle anywhere near as well.

While I am yet to tow our van with the new shocks I bet when I do it will not be as pleasant an experience. Koni it would seem changed the dampening so as to take some of the strain off of the shocks, I bet these ones last a lot longer than the first set. But it is at the cost of handling and stability.

Once I get to tow our van I will report back on how it handles with the new shocks but I'm not expecting much.

cheers,
Terry

Originally Posted by TerryO

Actually Dougal I don't believe that your 100% correct, stiffness of suspension can make a real difference when towing, when I first had new Koni shocks fitted to the D3 it towed our van incredibly well at any speed even on tight and twisty country roads.

I know stiffness makes a difference, I didn't claim otherwise.

I stated the geometry of the suspension makes the single biggest difference and is the reason most landrovers tow better than other vehicles of similar dimensions while having softer suspension.

This thread is of great interest to me. I tow a well known brand of off-road van that should weigh-in at 3500 Kg with 350 Kg on the ball. I found out, on our last trip, that these figures were complete BS and it wasn't all to do with how the van was loaded. Before I publish what the real weights were I'll give you a quick insight into what happens when a manufacturer builds and weighs their vans for the compliance plate.

Our van was built to carry two gas bottles, to carry 240 litres of water (160 litres of which is forward of the axles), built to carry a 2 KVA generator that was included in the price, has an extended drawbar so that a bicyle rack could be fitted (for two bikes), designed with the bed up front (where the largest stowage area is), built with two jerry can holders up front and designed to have three x 120 AH batteries in the front boot.

The reality is that the van is weighed without water, with only one gas bottle filled, without the generator stowed, without the bike rack fitted, no jerry cans equipped, no water or luggage on board. Like this, it apparently weighed a total of 2840 Kg, with the ball-weight not being specified.

I dutifully weighed everything that I put into the van (including filling the empty gas bottle) and have for years towed that van around thinking that I was legal.

Imagine my surprise when, on a whim, I weighed the car/van combo at a public weighbridge on our return from holiday, and found that the van was 330 Kg over - but worse still, the ball weight was 650 Kg!!!

I always knew that the bugger was heavy, just by the time it took the air suspension to re-level once the van was lowered onto the vehicle - but never did I think that it was so heavy.

Anyway, the vehicle actually handled this weight with great ease, surprisingly, and has been doing so for almost four years. To fix the issue we are selling the bikes and removing the rack, selling the generator that we never use anyway (and along with that will go the jerry can of fuel), relocating one of the 80 litre water tanks to behind the axle, removing almost 100 Kg of tools, oils, coolants and spares that we have been carrying around in the front boot of the van and relocating the batteries behind the axles (under the seats of the lounge.). This will solve both the weight and the weight distribution issues but will mean that we will have to go without some things that we once thought were necessities.

Without moving the water tank aft of the axles (and filling it to provide an 80 Kg counterbalance), we would NOT be able to achieve the legal ball weight for the vehicle (even with the batteries relocated), so the van manufacturer fudged something in the original weigh-in.

The reason I am posting this little self-confession is to express how thankful I am that the Disco's allowable ball-weight is 350 Kg and more to the point, that it was able to safely handle a bloody sight more.

Cheers

Russ

Glad you're sorting it - at 650kg ball-weight it would be easy to exceed the rear axle load limit!

Cheers,

Gordon

Hi Russ, good write up on your experience.
What hitch do you have?
Standard / Mitchell hitch?

This has been an interesting topic with a lot of technical info, thanks.If your weights are set up correctly, then the biggest single factor in safe towing has to be your driving style and driving to the conditions. This is only an example, but I regularly,(and legally) tow a 22.5 ton trailer behind a truck weighing 12.5 ton, with a ball weight of 3.5 ton. I change my driving style depending on the road, the weather, and the traffic, my point is, regardless of the load, size of your trailer, and weight distribution, drive to the conditions, commonsense I guess should prevail!

Originally Posted by gghaggis

Glad you're sorting it - at 650kg ball-weight it would be easy to exceed the rear axle load limit!

...let alone the towbar rating!

As LR's published max ball weight elsewhere in the world is 250 kg, I suspect the Oz 350 kg limit is to allow a 3.5T tow limit along with a 10% max rule somewhere in the ADRs.

Originally Posted by Graeme

...let alone the towbar rating!

As LR's published max ball weight elsewhere in the world is 250 kg, I suspect the Oz 350 kg limit is to allow a 3.5T tow limit along with a 10% max rule somewhere in the ADRs.

Suggest you read the previous four or so pages.