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Topic: Nose Weight

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John4703

30/10/2012 at 7:47pm
Location: Glasgow
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I feel that I am totally ignorant but how can I reduce the nose weight on my 2010 Sprite Conqueror.
We bough this a month ago and I checked the nose weight today and it is 90kg. I know this is too heavy but there is nothing heavy in the front locker except the Calor gas cylinder.
I would appreciate any advice for a newbie to caravanning.

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We camped for years. In 2019 we bought an Elddis Avante 454. We like it as it is short (6.9m) and fits in our driveway and has a fixed bed.
We had 127 nights away in the caravan in 2023.

tango55

30/10/2012 at 8:06pm
Location: Lichfield
Outfit: Coachman Amara 450

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Have you got the standard steel gas cylinders in the front locker? If you have then it may pay you to change to the 6kg. Calorlite cylinders as this is what I had to do to reduce my noseweight from 90 kgs. to 75 kgs.

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markh1

31/10/2012 at 10:10am
Location: East Lothian
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Why is 90kg too heavy? if your car can take it you can run up to the caravan chassis limit which you can check on the alko hitch (the weight limit is cast in) it'll be at least 100kg

johnks

31/10/2012 at 11:04am
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Unfortunately you don't say what car you are towing with so unable to offer any advice.

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John

tango55

31/10/2012 at 11:32am
Location: Lichfield
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Quote: Originally posted by markh1 on 31/10/2012
Why is 90kg too heavy? if your car can take it you can run up to the caravan chassis limit which you can check on the alko hitch (the weight limit is cast in) it'll be at least 100kg

But if your car can't official take a 90 kgs. load on the suspension then the noseweight has to be reduced accordingly which has been tested by the manufacturer regarding trailer stability and weight allowed on the rear shock absorber and springs etc. Examples are, Ford Focus MkI is 50 kgs. towball limit, MkII & MkIII are both 75kg. limits the same as my Volvo which is also built on a Ford Focus chassis which is also 75kgs. The vehicle handbook should give you the towball weight limit for that specific vehicle so it may help if the OP provided details regarding their towcar like Johnks said. If you look at the link below and click on the appropriate vehicle it will give you the downwards towball limit as well as the maximum trailer weight.

http://www.tow-trust.co.uk/towbar/

markh1

31/10/2012 at 12:36pm
Location: East Lothian
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Precisely Tango, hence the question to the OP, 'why is 90kg too heavy?'

My towbar and chassis limit are both 150kg, so we need to establish what they are towing with

Opensauce

31/10/2012 at 12:45pm
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Noseweight really needs to be at least 7% of caravan weight for stability, for your model 90kg is about minimum. If your car cannot take this weight on towbar then you need to get one that can. The only way to reduce noseweight is to load caravan behind axle & you may end up with an unstable tow.

While many average 2wd cars quote quite high max tow weights this is just a technical figure based on ability to hill start, you do need to keep to approx towbar download limit quoted for car. It is up to the driver to decide what is safe to tow & if you have to load a heavy caravan to reduce noseweight by too much you might have problems. All you can do is try it.

misterg

31/10/2012 at 8:12pm
Location: East Midlands
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The van chassis could have a max n/w. If you have a high car/tow bar n/w like markh1 above you may still have to keep an eye on how you load.

I had this problem with my van and eventually had to move spare wheel carrier back and put the mover behind the wheel instead of in front.

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Mister G

janus

01/11/2012 at 12:04am
Location: Rochdale
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Quote: Originally posted by Tentz on 31/10/2012
Noseweight really needs to be at least 7% of caravan weight for stability,

On what do you base this claim? Over 20 years I have found that 50kg is a little too light but acceptable with a light van and a car restricted to this. 75kg is very adequate and I have never found any need from a stability point of view to wish to exceed this.

On a point of interest 7% of my vans MTPLM is 101.5kg and with the caravan fully laden it has a noseweight of 72kg which is perfect for my car which is restricted to 75kg. I would defy you to find any vehicle that is more stable towing at all legal speeds than my outfit.

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Bill

For a licence dated 1997 or later you must add together the plated max weight of the caravan and trailer, if the total is 3500 or less you can tow it. You may even tow a caravan with a MAM greater than the cars unladen mass the restriction was removed in 2013

Mondeo Titanium 140 tdci

johnks

01/11/2012 at 7:53am
Location: Hampshire
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No point in continuing this as the person who asked the question has obviously lost interest or realised his question was a bit daft anyway!!!!!

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John

Opensauce

01/11/2012 at 8:47am
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Quote: Originally posted by janus on 01/11/2012
On what do you base this claim?

Ha!Ha! I thought you would be along shortly janus...I base the claim on acquired knowledge both from myself & others. Just like the 85% 'rule' it makes logical sense & the manufacturers seem to agree because there are occasional threads on here from folk with heavier caravans complaining they cannot get their noseweight below about 90kg without severely loading the rear.

I have never found reducing noseweight by loading the rear to be a problem in normal driving situation but of course things could be different if evasive action had to be taken at motorway speeds. If you read the rest of my post I did point out to the op that all he could do was try it & see, it depends on the caravan(as you have found), others have previously posted on here that they have found low noseweight on a heavy caravan produces an unstable tow.

The op's caravan(assuming its the one in his profile)is 1400kg odd on't road & it appears the manufacturer has designed in a noseweight of about 90kg(I guess they know better than us) & the only way he can reduce this is to load at the rear & see how it goes.

Sense & logic would dictate that correct way to load a caravan or trailer would be evenly with some bias to front, if by doing this you end up with excess noseweight for towcar then you will have to load caravan less than perfectly & see how it goes.

tango55

01/11/2012 at 2:36pm
Location: Lichfield
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Quote: Originally posted by johnks on 01/11/2012
No point in continuing this as the person who asked the question has obviously lost interest or realised his question was a bit daft anyway!!!!!

Well said and totally agree. This debate once again over noseweight which often occurs on here would not have taken place if the OP had answered the questions like johnks said. People either need advice or they don't it's as imple as that but lets not get into unnecessary debates amongst ourselves just because the OP doesn't respond.

Opensauce

01/11/2012 at 3:18pm
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The info the op sought is all in this thread & could be of use to others as well, this is the purpose of this forum. It is the op's choice if he posts again to thank those who posted that info & to seek clarification on any of the points raised.

The issue raised here is that for those wishing to tow a caravan of a weight near to limit of their car's towing capacity is that they need to understand that design noseweight of correctly loaded caravan may exceed limit for their towcar by a large margin & to correct this they will need to load rear end of caravan which may or may not affect handling.

John4703

02/11/2012 at 8:04pm
Location: Glasgow
Outfit: Elddis Avante 454

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Quote: Originally posted by johnks on 31/10/2012

Unfortunately you don't say what car you are towing with so unable to offer any advice.

we have a Volkswagon Golf TDi I appreciate all the advice so far but could not reply as the internet connection is poor on this camp site.

-------------
We camped for years. In 2019 we bought an Elddis Avante 454. We like it as it is short (6.9m) and fits in our driveway and has a fixed bed.
We had 127 nights away in the caravan in 2023.

neil and lena

02/11/2012 at 8:35pm
Location: Dumfries
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Quote: Originally posted by John4703 on 02/11/2012

Quote: Originally posted by johnks on 31/10/2012
Unfortunately you don't say what car you are towing with so unable to offer any advice.

we have a Volkswagon Golf TDi I appreciate all the advice so far but could not reply as the internet connection is poor on this camp site.

What is the noseweight limit on the Golf ? 75kg
And if Swift conqueror 480 is the new model it has a MPTLM of 1480kg which would make your towing match close to or over 100% even for the heaviest Golf diesel

John4703

02/11/2012 at 8:45pm
Location: Glasgow
Outfit: Elddis Avante 454

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Quote:
What is the noseweight limit on the Golf ? 75kg
And if Swift conqueror 480 is the new model it has a MPTLM of 1480kg which would make your towing match close to or over 100% even for the heaviest Golf diesel

The weight of the caravan in just under 70% of the weight of the Golf. I'll post the figures next week when home.
Thanks again for all the advice

-------------
We camped for years. In 2019 we bought an Elddis Avante 454. We like it as it is short (6.9m) and fits in our driveway and has a fixed bed.
We had 127 nights away in the caravan in 2023.

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