Thread: Does the towball weights still stand when

The ball weight still applies as it is determined by the manufacturer. I understand that like all major mods - the vehicle can be modified to have this increased (not sure what) but would then require engineering certification.

Garry

I tow heavy loads with my 130 defender all the time.
I dont know what the maximum ball weight on a 130 can be legally.
I do know the chassis and suspension as stock with the dual rear coils will handle the weight no problems.
The standard motors and transmissions are the limiting thing in the real world with these vehicles.
If repowered with the bigger motor the transmission will give out in short order with that sort of towing.
I have standardisd most of my towing with pintle hooks these days.
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It may be cheaper to re-engineer the caravan and move the axle forward a little.

or,
what idiot designs a 300kg ball weight,,

(sorry MarknDeb)

Originally Posted by MarknDeb

you use a pintle hook setup on a fender 130, a mate is thinking of buying a TDI 130 then taking the engine out and fitting the new Isuzu 5.2lt 4cylinder engine but the only thing holding him back is the ball weight as he needs to have a 300kg ball weight for his caravan, so we started wondering about what happens when you change over to a pintle then fit heavy spring and also a set of pollies to keep the bum of the 130 in the air, or can there be modifications made to the 130 to increase the ball weight ???? i have searched the net and can not find any info on this.

The D130 will take that just not legally... as for jacking the suspension up to level the back end look at the implications of the weight transfer... The more weight you put on the back end the more weight it lifts off of the front unless you use a weight distribution type hitch which though the magic of levers puts some weight back onto the front of the vehicle.

The stiffer you make the suspension via whatever method you choose to keep the tail end up the harsher its going to ride which can occasionally make the handling interesting and at a minimum the extra bumping can get annoying.

My idea would be to rework the caravan to lower its draw bar weight and that can be as simple as putting a second spare on the rear bar, moving your cloths bags further back in the van or shifting the water tank from its normal spot and extending the plumbing to suit.

IMHO 250kg of draw bar weight is too much. The rough rule I use is If you cant lift the tow hitch on and off by yourself (excluding some stiffly sprung tandems) then your too heavy.

It also pays to remember that your draw bar down weight also comes out of your vehicles max payload. (ie if you have 250kg of drawbar weight on a 1t vehicle you can now only put 750kg on the tray.)

Originally Posted by Pedro_The_Swift

or,
what idiot designs a 300kg ball weight,,

(sorry MarknDeb)

Its a 19'6" (internal) Kedron ATV caravan and weighs in at just under 3.5t fully loaded water and all, so the ball is not to bad, in the Kedron owners group one person has a Top Ender caravan and she weighs in just under 4t so he bought the 200 cruiser then sent it to Sydney and had it converted into a 6x and 3 foot extension of the chasis, now has a tow capacity ofg 4.5t

Originally Posted by Blknight.aus

The D130 will take that just not legally... as for jacking the suspension up to level the back end look at the implications of the weight transfer... The more weight you put on the back end the more weight it lifts off of the front unless you use a weight distribution type hitch which though the magic of levers puts some weight back onto the front of the vehicle.

The stiffer you make the suspension via whatever method you choose to keep the tail end up the harsher its going to ride which can occasionally make the handling interesting and at a minimum the extra bumping can get annoying.

My idea would be to rework the caravan to lower its draw bar weight and that can be as simple as putting a second spare on the rear bar, moving your cloths bags further back in the van or shifting the water tank from its normal spot and extending the plumbing to suit.

IMHO 250kg of draw bar weight is too much. The rough rule I use is If you cant lift the tow hitch on and off by yourself (excluding some stiffly sprung tandems) then your too heavy.

It also pays to remember that your draw bar down weight also comes out of your vehicles max payload. (ie if you have 250kg of drawbar weight on a 1t vehicle you can now only put 750kg on the tray.)

To move water tanks around would be good if there was enough room left to do so but you look underneath and all you see is water tanks tucked away between the chasis rails.

Thats a huge set-up.
nearly 7 ton!