Break-away cables

[Peri_5109318]

Is it possible to purchase and retrospectively fit a longer break-away cable? I own a Bailey Senator 5 Carolina that I tow with a Land Rover 110 Defender. The Defender is fitted with an adjustable tow bar that mounts a slider plate. The tow ball is fitted to a Dixon Bate Shocklink that doubles as the slider plate and is attached to the adjustable bar by two 19mm pins secured by 'R' clips. The break-away cable should, according to Dixon Bate, wrap around the lateral bar at the top of the adjustable bar, but is too short to reach. The caravan dealership workshop staff clipped the cable to the open end of one of the 19mm pins but a) this was clipped and not wrapped round the pin and b) Dixon Bate state that under no circumstance should the open end of the pin be used in this way. The locating holes for the 19mm pins are too narrow to accommodate the break-away cable clip and so I am left with no option but to wrap the cable around the towball. Are cables manufactured to a standard length, or is it possible to purchase one about 4" longer than the one fitted at the factory?

regards

 

[Viking1]

Peri

You need to shop a round as I see one with defeat clip on them and it easy to chage just cut the old one off.

Mark

 

[rob_jax]

Hi Peri,

This is / can be a problem with detachable tow-bars as well.

Looping the breakaway cable around something that may itself come loose is not a good idea - and you could even say that the normal UK bolt-on tow-ball is not the best place either as I've seen loose tow-balls as well.

On a detachable tow-bar there is a rigid loop on the bracket, which is always too small to loop the cable through but will happily take the clip - which is not recommended

So the solution is either:

To replace the flimsy clip with a special carabiner type clip sold expressly for this task - this new clip is strong enough to guarantee applying the brakes before it or the cable fails.

Or to add a robust U-shackle with a bolt closure to the mounting and loop the standard cable through that.

In your case:

If you believe that the 19mm pin is strong enough and robust enough to support the uprated carabiner style clip - then you could simply do that.

Or add a robust U-shackle to the tow bar and loop through that.

Robert

 

[Lutz]

The break-away cable is not intended as a secondary safety cable between car and trailer but only to ensure that the brakes on the trailer are applied if the two break apart. So long as it serves this purpose it doesn't really matter if the clip opens up after it's done its job. Therefore, it only has to be adequately but not excessively strong.

 

[JTQ]

Peri,

I towed with a 110 and Shocklink. I fitted a reasonably deep heavy duty "D" Shackle through the eye of the lower D-pin and looped the cable in the intended way through the Shackle. Got the shackle from Marine Chandlers.