Thread: Disco 4 self-levelling and towing caravan

Funny isnt it...

We're looking at Tin Tents at the moment...

2 big Van places in Adelaide - at both the staff said "Discovery 4 - Great tow vehicle"

So keep a look out for "Tombies Family Road Blocker" coming soon

I am new to AULRO but am interested in your blog about picking up a 3.5t van. I have a Disco 4 3l and a van at 3.5t and agree it pulls well, but I have an enormous issue (I think) with the suspension. As soon a road undulates a bit, driving and sitting in the disco4 is like riding in a small boat in choppy seas.
Do you have the same experience?
Have you any advice for me?
Regards
Brian
brianalcoe@internode.on.net

Hi Terry,

That van looks great behind a disco... What brand/mail and size is it? Do you find it ok to tow on dirt roads? What t ype of suspension on the van?

We have just started looking for something similar hence the question.

Cheers, Peter.

Brian how good are your shocks, mine are getting near replacement time and the car is a bit rollypoly on corners etc but we have 183k on the clock 60K + towing a 3 ton off road van (Kedron) so its only to be expected.

Also are you using height adjusting rods etc (Lamis?).

Mine is a Feb 05 manufacture TDV6 which we have had since new, bought to tow the van, have not regretted it. Also we have a Mitch hitch to keep the van level when towing.

Enjoy,

Ryall.

Brian, there have been rear shocks at least replaced on some D4s whilst still in warranty. If your D4 is still in warranty it might be worth having the shocks assessed although some dealers' mechanics have no clue as to what indicates that shocks are no longer any good. I wore-out D3 shocks in 60K kms not towing anything much but don't know how long D4 shocks would have lasted if left fitted. Other than shocks, perhaps you can move some weight from the front and/or rear of the van more towards its centre.

Originally Posted by Brian Alcoe

I am new to AULRO but am interested in your blog about picking up a 3.5t van. I have a Disco 4 3l and a van at 3.5t and agree it pulls well, but I have an enormous issue (I think) with the suspension. As soon a road undulates a bit, driving and sitting in the disco4 is like riding in a small boat in choppy seas.
Do you have the same experience?
Have you any advice for me?
Regards
Brian
brianalcoe@internode.on.net

3.5T????. I hope that weight is ATM!!!!! Otherwise your overweight and illegal.
Regards
Robbo

Originally Posted by Oakey

Hello Terry

Thanks for your advice about the self-leveling system of the Disco. I picked up our off-road van yesterday. It is quite a high van and the nose does dip a bit. I note on your photo that your van sits very level. Did you need to add a higher tongue on your tow bar? best wishes Robert

Hi Oakey,

As Bigjohn mentioned I have a Mitch Hitch fitted, that along with a Trigg hitch makes towing on and or off road easy, quite, and very smooth.

And we have towed our van to some pretty rough off road spots. In that picture the D3 is at off road height and with 1" taller diameter tyres, even with the Mitch hitch and taller tyres fitted to the Disco the van is slightly nose down at normal road height.

I have since fitted much larger 265/70/16's which has given the van even better ground clearance, but only leaves about 10 mm gap between the tyres and the chassis rails. Still I had the these larger A/T's sitting around so I used them and so far they have not touched even when the vans suspension has been sitting on the bump stops going over some obstacles.

cheers,
Terry

Originally Posted by RoverLander

Hi Terry,

That van looks great behind a disco... What brand/mail and size is it? Do you find it ok to tow on dirt roads? What t ype of suspension on the van?

We have just started looking for something similar hence the question.

Cheers, Peter.

Hi Peter,

It is a Jayco Sterling Outback pop top,the model is a 17.55-3, the van is basically a 18' box in size. I ordered it new and with the following optional extra's fitted at the factory.

Simplicity suspension (lifts the off road van another 2")
Larger 16" wheels & taller A/T tyres.
Trigg hitch
2 x 100 amp battery's
3 x82 litre water tanks
Larger 150 litre three way fridge (crap fridge)

Then we made some changes to make it better for free bush camping in all weathers, below in part is what I had fitted;

Webasto diesel heater (really important in a pop top)
2 x 135 w Kyocera solar panels with 2 Inch stand off brackets and a ProStar 30m regulator.
Replace all bulbs with LED's
Fit Caframo marine gimbal fans for cooling in summer, they use bugger all power, are extremely quite and are excellent for cooling.

With this basic set up we find we can go most places the people we go camping with go with their off road camper trailers in the bush. The main restriction is the width of the van as its about 12 inches plus wider than the Disco. In most cases height nor length is an issue, but you can't go to the really hard to get to spots that you can in a camper. With the extra water you can extend a bush stay to about 2 weeks without topping up the tanks, if your frugal. With this decent amount of good quality solar fitted and LED lights the two battery's to date has never run out of power. We also have a 60 litre chest fridge that runs off of the vans solar, so in total we have over 200 litres of refrigeration.

There's lots of other stuff we have done to get the set up right that I have not mentioned here by the way.

How does it tow? ...really well both on and off road, fully laden it weighs just over 2.5 ton and the D3 tows it easy.

We are in Goulburn so if you would like to see the Van and how we have set it up just PM me and your welcome to come check it out.