What do I need to tow my 2 tonne caravan?

We started our caravan adventures when we had a Commodore. We thought the 5.7 litre V8 engine would be well capable of towing a full sized caravan. We soon learnt that cars like Commodores are constructed for occasional towing of things that are up to their own weight, and once the towed weight exceeds the vehicle weight, things deteriorate rapidly.

As all the latter lessons in towing were detracting greatly from our pleasure, we chose to trade the Commodore in on a more capable tow vehicle.

At the time of making a selection for a replacement vehicle, a number of factors were considered. In a basic descending sequence our selection process looked like what is presented on this page.

You may raise your eyebrows or shake your head at our final selection, but just remember - what works for one person may not work for another!

Petrol, diesel or LPG?

When you load a vehicle up and put a large weight behind it then want an engine to haul it down the road,

• An LPG powered engine will suck almost twice as much fuel as it normally would on the highway.
• A petrol engine will take somewhere between half as much again to twice as much fuel to pull the load on a highway.
• A diesel engine will generally use up to half as much fuel again out on the highway. (Some diesels are a lot less fuel efficient than others).

LPG may cost a lot less per litre, but you will be using almost twice as much and it is not available if you are travelling to some remoter areas. This means you will need to plan your fuel stops closely, or ensure you've also topped up your petrol tank to supplement your LPG tank range.

Petrol will be available most places you go, but as your vehicle will be drinking it quite heavily, you'll need to plan your fuel stops or consider carrying jerry cans.

A diesel engine is usually quite happy pulling loads, and the fuel economy shouldn't be too adversely affected (depending on how you drive). Although the pump price is usually higher than petrol, you will get a lot further on a tank full, and it is available in most remote areas.

Make that a 2.4 tonne van

We wanted to be able to legally (and comfortably) tow our van even if it was fully loaded. We needed to find a vehicle that was rated to tow at least 2400 kilograms. We also needed the vehicle to be able to legally carry the weight on the tow ball plus my weight plus Shona's plus the caravan jack and a few tools and some basic recovery gear.

That meant the vehicle would be loaded with somewhere around 520 kilograms.

Unleaded petrol

• Current cost: $1.20 per litre
• Non-tow l/100k: 13
• Cost for 100 kilometres: $15.60
• Towing l/100k: 19
• Cost for 100 kilometres: $22.80
• Cost for 5000 kilometres: $1140
• Usual tank size (litres): 75
• Usable before fill (80%): 60
• Fills for 5000k trip: 15.8

LPG

• Current cost per litre: $0.48
• Non-tow l/100k: 11
• Cost for 100 kilometres: $5.28
• Towing l/100k: 21
• Cost for 100 kilometres: $10.08
• Cost for 5000 kilometres: $504
• Usual tank size (litres): 60
• Usable before fill (80%): 48
• Fills for 5000k trip: 21.9

Diesel

• Current cost per litre: $1.29
• Non-tow l/100k: 10
• Cost for 100 kilometres: $12.90
• Towing l/100k: 17
• Cost for 100 kilometres: $21.93
• Cost for 5000 kilometres: $1096.50
• Usual tank size (litres): 90
• Usable before fill (80%): 72
• Fills for 5000k trip: 11.8

So what's wrong with a family car?

Apart from what is mentioned above about the engineering design being only intended for occasional towing, the ratings of a Commodore are 2100kg towed and 210kg on  the tow ball. The maximum load in the car is 408 kilograms, so with the caravan hitched (and loaded to a maximum weight of 2100kg), only Shona and I could get in before we reached the maximum weight. The jack, tools and recovery gear would have to stay in the garage.

A Falcon is rated to tow 200kg more and take 20kg more on the tow ball than a Commodore. There's no maximum load figures on their web site, but I don't think they are rated to take much more of a load than a Commodore can.

In short, a family car didn't have enough towing nor carrying capacity for the van we'd bought. We needed to either shrink our van or upgrade to a four wheel drive.

An automatic diesel 4x4

We'd figured out that we couldn't comfortably tow our van with a family car, and if we had to upgrade we'd go for a diesel engine. As indicated toward the bottom of  our motoring page, I needed the vehicle to also be automatic.

We were doing this exercise in 2003 and our options looked a little like one of the following: a Ford F250, Holden Jackaroo, Toyota Land Cruiser 78 or 100 or Prado, Nissan Patrol 3 litre, Range Rover, Land Rover Discovery, VW Transporter T5, BMW X5, Mercedes Benz ML270, Mitsubishi Pajero, Jeep Grand Cherokee or Cherokee. The Audi Allroad CS and Holden Rodeo were eliminated before they got to  this list as they had tow limits of below 2400kg. The VW Touareg nor the Ssangyong Musso had not been released when we were looking.

Apart from what was shown on the manufacturer's websites at the time, we started to look at some of these in car yards in a lot more detail.

Ford F250

These things are huge! They're 6.3 metres long and most car parks are only 5.5 metres. Nevertheless we headed off and had a close look at a few of them. I was getting myself used to the size and considering how we'd go with one in suburbia until Shona got behind the wheel and looked at me through the gap between the steering wheel and the dashboard with a "You've got to be kidding me" look on her face!

In case you haven't read it on another part of this site yet - I need a left foot accelerator pedal to be able to drive a car, so any "test drive" would have been Shona driving and me sitting in the passenger seat!

There was no way that Shona could be coaxed into driving one of these down any road regardless of how much traffic was around.

Toyota Land Cruiser

We never actually took one of these out for a test drive either, but we did sit in a few Land Cruiser 100's and look at all the buttons and dials. A friend had helped me move house with one of the 4.5 litre petrol models and it had no acceleration at all going up hills. Whilst it was a "real" four wheel drive and could seat 8 people, we didn't believe we needed either of those features.

Also capable of towing 3500 kilograms if you needed to (and we didn't). We knew another few people with these and the vehicle stayed home a lot as they couldn't really afford the running costs! We wanted a vehicle that we could use every day and wanted to avoid having to keep it in the driveway until it was time to take out the caravan.

Toyota Prado

We weren't actually aware of the new body styling when we were looking as we dismissed the Prado on it's general lack of engine capability. The power and torque numbers are very low even though a 180 litre fuel tank might have been nice!

Holden Jackaroo

I was never a fan of Jackaroos from their very first model so we didn't spend much time at all looking in this direction. As it happened this was the last of this model they made.

BMW X5

I suppose you could say I was immediately sold on X5's from when I'd seen my first one a couple of years earlier. I could never imagine keeping one of these on the road until they brought their first diesel into Australia. After the 7.3 litre F250 Ford (or even the 3.2 litre Pajero), this 3 litre engine certainly didn't sound like a diesel.

Mercedes ML270

We also never gave the Mercedes too much consideration. A friend had recently purchased two cars from a dealership and they were giving him the run-around. His bad experiences with the dealers were enough to make us not even bother having a look at one of these. We've since met one couple using one of these to tow their van and they are very happy with it.

Mitsubishi Pajero DiD

We took one of these out and were quite impressed with it. You could tell it was a diesel, but it still had spirited performance. We'd even signed up for it but that fell through. The additional instrument binnacle was cute, but we were never keen on the bulges over the front wheels.

Land Rover Discovery

We'd spent a fair amount of time in a dealership looking at the various models before we decided against them. The doors didn't open very wide, and the engine seemed to be under-powered. We did try very hard to get impressed by them though!

Jeep (Grand) Cherokee

Not one that we gave too much consideration to at the time. Someone in  the family had one a few years earlier and I hadn't been impressed. All the owners we've heard of since have been very impressed with their cars.

Nissan Patrol

Shona had to drive one of the slightly earlier models not long before we started looking for an upgrade to the Commodore. She said it was like driving a hovercraft that went largely wherever it wanted to and there was no way we were going to own one! Whilst there might be a lot of admirers of these out there, we were not about to join their ranks!

Ssangyong Musso

Although it wasn't out when we were looking, it is added in for those who may be interested. It is interesting that the Rexton would appear to have better numbers for towing than the Musso, but it is rated by Ssangyong to tow much less weight?

VW Touareg

The petrol version came out not too much after we'd finished our purchase, and the diesel was another 6 months or so later again. All the numbers associated with the diesel are phenomenal (including the price). The torque exceeds what the 7.3 litre Ford engine outputs, but you can only put 140kg on the tow ball.

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