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 Topic: Winching a caravan
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28/8/2021 at 4:56pm
Location: London
Outfit: Lunar Cosmos 524
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If you look at a typical caravan chassis (Alko), the rails rear of the axle have no other purpose than the rather lightweight duty of supporting the floor and corner steadies, and their tapering and dimensions reflect this, there are also no bracing brackets between the rails and they are not intended to take any dynamic loads, in fact the static loads are shared with the wooden caravan floor!
BTW, perhaps stating the 'bleeding obvious', but it needs to be done just in case you are unfamiliar with the flimsy construction of caravan bodies, those kinds of winching loads could only be taken by a metal chassis, not ANY part of the body!
IMHO (as a design engineer, so not entirely without knowledge), there is not really any point that you could safely (without risking distorting chassis/damaging wooden floor) attach a winch cable to the standard chassis at the rear. Alko advise against drilling and/or welding the chassis to attach anything to it, so you shouldn't modify it by addition of any winch attachment points. If you were to ignore advice and create some winch attachment (may leave you in a parlous state with insurers, as unauthorised modification!), then it would have to project down sufficiently to allow any winch cable to be completely clear of the body, that would likely mean if it were a permanent fitment it would be at risk of grounding during normal towing over uneven ground, traffic calming humps etc.
Winching off a single chassis rail would likely induce slew into the caravan which in turn would put lateral dynamic load on the chassis rail which it was never intended to cope with, almost certainly it would tend to flex and rip off of it's attachment to the floor! A standard caravan chassis is so feeble you cannot even jack up the van on it without additional reinforced jacking points being added! You would ideally need to put a substantial new cross member in between the rails to give you a central winching point, quite how that would match with location of corner steadies, plumbing and cabling, and spare wheel carrier if fitted I couldn't say without closer examination of a chassis, and again with any permanent projection downwards, normal towing ground clearance would be compromised.
I sympathise with your problem, but feel rather than winching the caravan backwards, you should be looking at alternative solutions. Depending on which brand/model of motor mover you have fitted, many should be able to cope with up to a 1:4 (25%) incline (my Powrtouch Evolution does), which is on a par with the very steepest roads you will ever encounter, and getting to the point where a 2 wheel drive car would struggle with traction (I've driven the 1:4 mountain passes in Cumbria and northern Spain, and you certainly don't want to try and pull away from a standing start - that is VERY steep!). Alternatively, winching the van up nose first, eliminates all the chassis straining issues, as the tow hitch is designed for the task and stresses involved. Backwards or forwards, I'd be highly concerned about a winch/cable/attachment failing and the caravan becoming a runaway on such a steep incline! Inch by inch progressive chocking of BOTH wheels to match progress would be essential IMHO.
Synchronising winching AND Motor Mover as a means of assisting Motor Mover seems to potentially introduce it's own problems, suspect the Motor Mover gearbox may suffer if it's load is jerky and alternating between loaded and unloaded as irregular pulls from the winch may cause, especially as it may be strained to near it's capacity by the incline! Not an impossible situation, but a caution.
Not an encouraging reply I'm afraid, but hopefully steering you away from something potentially disastrously expensive if tried incorrectly and failing!
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via mobile 28/8/2021 at 2:20pm
