My first bad journey

[Phil_5115351]

On return from our excellent bank holiday in the yorkshire dales, we used the A1 south from just below scotch corner to the M62 and ecountered major stability problems with our outfit. The van was rocking and moving, and swinging around all over the place which ment I was forced to travel at 45 - 50 mph on this strech which is not a problem untill you realise just how many lorries go past you on a busy motorway!

This is the first time I have used my latest tow car with my caravan and all the checks the made before setting off - ie tyre pressures on car and van, proper packing, correct placing items around the van - all the same as every other time we have towed.

The car is a 2003 Mondeo TDci and the caravan an older one weighing approx 1100kg. I previously pulled this with a 1996 vauxhall vectra with no problems what so ever - the rear suspension was uprated though!

The only indication as too why it was such a poor journey could have been that, behind the towing hitch where the large rubber sleeve hides the spring for the braking was fully closed and could be opened or closed by hand - this is not right as it should have more tension in it.

I watched many other vans overtake me with no apparent problems so any ideas would be appriciated

 

[Garfield]

It sounds like your brake linkage and damper have failed in some way, get them checked before you go out again!

 

[andrew1608]

your not the only one with this problem, i went down to yorkshire and came off at Bedale junction, i went down from Edinburgh, my outfit was fine i kept up around 60mph most of the time where possible averaging 37mpg, but my friend who was towing using my company car Astra 1.7cdti estate which pulls a swift corniche 16/3 was struggling coming back, now again i was fine i use the scott stabiliser and only felt a couple of bits of wind going up from scotch corner to torness but nothing to worry about but my friend really was snaking badly coming south yesterday a couple of time i actually had to brake becuase i thought he was loosing control but he also uses a scott stabiliser but i think it is the friction plates which are needing tightened up.

 

[Steve L]

Hi Phil.

While your hitch does need attention, you may of been suufering from a worn out road surface. The A1 has a phenominal amount of HGV traffic and unforunately due to the constant pounding the road surface gets you get tram lines in the road.

The pitch of the average caravan between the wheels is narrower than that of the lorries and so your van will swing side to side as each wheel tries to take up position in the ruts.

There's not a lot you can do about it except do what you did and that was to slow down to reduce the effect.

Steve.

 

[Mikey66]

Phil,

I too experienced some instability on a section of the M5 near Droitwich yesterday which had "tram lines" - my 'van did start to swing from side to side. This was towards the end of an otherwise completely stable 150 mile trip - the 'van is a 52% match, fully laden, to my Discovery 3.

 

[Phil_5115351]

Thanks for the replys

Its good to know that there maybe other reasons beyond my control that affected the stability but the road was not bad in areas and our friends who were travelling behind us did not have as many problems as us. Ans many other vans passed us that did not seem to that unstable, although we watched a few bounce around. Maybe others are more obvilous to the movement and choose to ignore it.

I am wondering weather the fact that I had just completed a front end refurb - changing rotten timbers etc has affected the nose weight.

So possible reasons - dodgy brakes and hydraulic damper on caravan, possible reduced nose weight, poor road surface, very windy.