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 Many thanks for all your feedback on my previous thread and by way of an update:

Cut a long story short due to a (an unprintable word) of a landlord and neighbours   we are being forced into swapping from a m/home (stored on our drive) to a Caravan to be kept in storage (very long story - if anyone really wants to know I will be more than happy vent my frustration and explain why)

We were going to upgrade our car next July to something towing friendly, then sell the motorhome and swap over to a Caravan at that point, however our hand has been forced early. After spending an inordinate amount of time plugging data into the caravan clubs outfit matching service we ended up with two pages of Caravan matches for our current car which is a 1.6 Petrol 16v Vauxhall Zafira. I know it’s about as up to the job as a Mr Bean vs Tyson grudge match but it is what we have for now.

After talking through our predicament with a very helpful local dealer (Castle Caravans in Hullbridge thank you) he has sourced a lighter weight van and done a deal where we can effectively straight swap our very old but perfectly good motorhome with a 4 berth Elddis Wisp 450 CT max gross weight 954 kg as indicated on the label near the door.

We have plugged all this into the outfit matching service and come up with this:

The Club advises that a Vauxhall Zafira Club 1.6i 16v (2001) can, with warnings, tow an Elddis Wisp 450/CT (1993)

·         1 Kerbweight ratio: 76%

·         The caravan's laden weight is within 85% of the car's kerb weight, and therefore meets Club guidelines.

·         1 Towing limit ratio: 87%

·         The caravan's laden weight is within the car's stated towing limit, and therefore meets legal limitations.

·         1 Gross train weight ratio: 98%

·         We do not have a gross train weight figure for this car. There is a small risk of the car’s GTW being exceeded if both car and caravan are heavily laden, as some car makers define GTW as less than the sum of the car and the caravan’s fully laden weights. However, we judge this outfit unlikely to suffer this problem. To be absolutely sure of not exceeding this legal limit, though, check the car’s GTW suitability by referring to the retailer or maker (or the weight plate on the car, if available).

·         1 Nose weight ratio: 93%

·         The car's nose weight should be fine to safely tow this caravan. If this figure is high, however, (typically over 100%) care will be needed to load the caravan so that the car’s nose weight limit is not exceeded, but this should be practically achievable. Aim for 5-7% of the caravan’s actual laden weight without overloading the car.

·         2 BHP per ton : 39

·         The car's engine power is quite low to tow this caravan. It may be sluggish and uncomfortable on hills or at junctions.

Vauxhall Zafira Club 1.6i 16v (2001)

More info

Elddis Wisp 450/CT (1993)

Everything is green ticked as a good match by the caravan club except for the BHP per tonne figure which is 39 and we believe that the minimum should be forty.

We know our car is not the ideal tow car by quite a margin and we would prefer to wait to get a suitable tow car next July but unfortunately we can’t for the reasons listed above. We also have two rallys booked (Halloween and New Year) and can't cancel as the kids will get upset and we may lose some money already paid on them and to be frank even though it is a straight swap I am sure the Dealer will be doing better out of it financially than us

So we will not be going too far at all, we live in Essex which is more or less flat and we have no major trips planned until after we change cars

We are new to caravan towing (although did tow a trailer tent for a while) and would prefer to err on the side of caution but in the in the real world could we suffer this for a few months?

Sorry to hear of your predicament.

Why not put your Motorhome into storage. Then you can wait until you change cars, this would leave you with more choice of caravans.

Meanwhile you could attempt a private sale of your Motorhome [from storage] - no P/X would help you to buy another caravan at a better price or even buy privately.

If you do tow the above outfit keep heavy stuff in the car and keep caravan weight down. 76% is fine, you will just use the lower gears more often and mpg will suffer.

Good luck.

Many thanks for the feedback so far, to be honest for the silly little journeys we will be doing for the ralleys are about 12-15 miles away so MPG and speed are not contributing factors. Even come spring summer we won't be venturing that far until our main holiday in August but we will have a decent car by then. So no Motorways, no long steep hills. The most major road we will go on will probably be the A12

My main concern other than being legal is being safe i.e. not being a danger to myself/others on the road. I think the outfit will be safe provided I don't do anything stupid. If I have to go up steep hills at 45mph in fourth at 15 mpg so be it. I do that already with the camper. As long as it can go, stop and not be weaving all over the place.

We thought about storage  It is really weird but I feel strange keeping a m. home in storage but I feel Ok keeping a Van in storage?. We have only just taxed teh m. home so we can get money back on that. We were going to put in for a mechanical and habitation service in January  so we will save on that and the caravan is going through a service now so we don't have to worry about that till next year.

All in all money wise the deals not too bad and the van is exactly what we were looking for as a starter van we also have to consider the what we think we can sell the m. home for and what we actually get for it factor.

All things considered the swap is probably best for us and only costing what we may or may not make in profit from the private sale of the camper.

Thanks for all the feedback.

I will update you as regards our first tow as soon as it happens