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 Topic: Advice on max legal towable weight please
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03/8/2020 at 1:34pm
Location: Midlands
Outfit: 2019 VW Arteon + 2002 Avondale Dart
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Hi Ben
I'm afraid that, from a purely legal perspective, all of the answers above are wrong.
Legally, there are only three weights that matter (and none of these can be exceeded):
- The maximum permissible weight of your car
- The MTPLM of your caravan
- The maximum permissible gross train weight of your car and trailer combined.
Your car's towing limit is calculated by subtracting its maximum permissible weight from the gross train weight (i.e. it assumes the car is fully loaded). But if your car's towing limit is 1500kg, you could still legally tow 1550kg provided that you ensured that the car was loaded to at least 50kg less than its maximum capacity.
However, from a practical and sensible perspective, this approach is likely to be problematic.
Firstly, short of physically weighing the entire contents of both your car and caravan, how will you actually know the weights of either to within 50kg. The food and drink you buy during a big supermarket shop could weigh more than that.
Secondly, the towing limits of cars are set by the manufactuers based on the weight of a commerical trailer - not a high-sided caravan - that the car can physically move from a standing hill start. You're asking a lot of the car if you plan to tow a caravan (which will have a higher wind resistance) of that weight on a long journey, and it will inevitably struggle for performance.
The recommendation to tow at 85% of the car's kerbweight has no legal relevance whatsoever. It is purely a recommendation, which given by the two main caravanning clubs for novice towers provided that to do so is legally permissible.
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