Message Forums

We're thinking of changing our towcar to a Mondeo (turbo diesel) 2.0 at least and just wondered if anyone could give their opinions as a towcar for our Bailey Ranger 460/4 please?  It won't be brand new one by the way, probably 02/03 ish.

We want something fairly reliable and not so expensive to run as it will my everyday car aswell (although I don't do that many miles).  Thanks in advance.

Jules

Was at Castlerigg farm(Keswick) campsite two weeks ago and the fellow next to us had one and he was singing nothing but praises about his.I don,t know what van he was towing but it was not small.

Hi

I had an 53 plate 130ps tdci, I was an excellent tow car but like many many others of that era suffered a failure of the dual mass flywheel and needed new injectors at 90,000 miles or so.

(Cost £2500 or so to put right)

This problem has apparently been resolved on the later models  (so they say)

There have been many threads on this, check them out.

Mr UM

I have had my Mondeo TDCi115 LX for three years now and have nothing but praise for it both as a car for everyday and as a tow car. I tow a 1450kg Hymer Nova 470 and it is the most stable and competent towcar that I have had in the 17 years that I have been caravning On the motorways I get on and by the end of the acceleratio lane I will be doing 55mph and be in 5th gear with the cruise set, apart from traffic I never need to touch it anywhere on the network. I live next to the M62 and it goes up the hill on the M62 going east towards Huddersfield in 5th, and going the other way I have taken it over shap and up Beattock in 5th at 55mph. I average 34mpg towing and 49mpg without the van on the back.

Lovely tow car when they aren`t in the garage. The estates especially are very soft at the back end making ferry loading and sharp dips on speed bumps a bit uncomfortable to say the least.

If you do buy a TDCi of that age I would make absolutely sure that the flywheel has been changed as this going wrong can cause failure of the starter motor and clutch. Can, as Ultimates says, cost literally thousands to sort out.

If it hasnt been sorted walk away. Many others havent and have lived to regret it.See the archives.

Fantastic!  Thanks everyone for the replies - we'll definitely check the flywheels have been changed on any models we look at and I'll have a quick look at the Octavia too. 

Thanks once again.

Jules

great cars , like has been said injectors are dodgy on 02-04 tdci`s and flywheels can fail, but they have been known to fail on the "better" cars form the VAG as well.

check the service log and if its got 80k on and no flywheel change walk away,theres thousands of others out there