Newbie - Nose Weight help

[Neil_374459237]

Hi, we are new to caravanning, and have just bought a Bailey Pageant Champagne. We are going to collect it this Saturday, some 90 miles away and I am slightly worried about the nose weight.

We are unable to sort out a towbar for our Mondeo Estate in time, although I am assured once sorted it will make a good towcar.

So we are going to use our Sprinter 311 MWB. Now I know that there is no problem with max towing weight! But what about nose weight, I cannot find any details about the maximum for a Sprinter. Also will we need to take some ballast to adjust the caravan noseweight? as there won't be anything inside.

Your help would be appreciated.

 

[Pete & Ev]

Hi Neil, welcome to the forum.

It may depend on the age of the sprinter but there is a requirement for the tow bar/ball to carry a specification label which will have a max. "S" value which is effectively the nose weight rating for the towbar.

Take a look, you could be lucky...

Pete...

 

[Neil_374459237]

I have already looked and there is nothing visible. It is a 53 reg, so not THAT old. I have not got a handbook for the van, so I cannot check there either!

 

[ProfJohnL]

Hello Neil,

I don't know the nose weight limit for a sprinter but I pretty certain it will be at least 75Kg and probably quite a bit more.

According to the Bailey web site your caravan has an MTPLM of 1410kg, so to be compliant with the minimum of 4% EU nose weight Regs you will need to set it up to have at least 57Kg nose load.

 

[Neil_374459237]

Ok so it would be fairly safe to go to 70kg nose weight, so would we need to take something with us to add, I do have a couple of old gas bottles, supagas with a strange regulator fitting, but I guess they would do for ballast. Do you think I would need more?

 

[ProfJohnL]

Form a previous thread, I believe that Bailey caravan reckon the ex-works nose weight of all their caravan is 35kg. I am sure that if you ring Bailey they should be able to tell you.

Don't forget that because the tow hitch is further away from the caravan wheels than the gas bottle locker, to increase the nose load by a 10Kg you will need to add considerably more than that to the bottle locker. How much more I cannot say, that depends on the relative distances of the hitch and gas bottle locker from the main axle.

 

[Neil_374459237]

I have a couple of gas bottles, and several 10kg weights, might throw them in the van for "justin". I guess I will need a noseweight gauge, so I can pick one up tomorrow. I have swapped the towball for an Alko? one, numberplates will be supplied by dealer, need to remember paperwork. Is there anything else I should take?

 

[Neil_374459237]

Well, just collected our van using the Sprinter and it was a dream to tow, no problems at all, in fact we travelled from the South Coast up to the M4 along the A350, lots of hills and very twisty in places. We have bought a nose gauge, and will check once we have worked out what we are going to keep in the van. Only problem was trying to get the van onto our drive, need more practice at reversing, but I also don't think our road is wide enough, so we had to push it on, and there is a slope to our drive, I can forsee a mover before long.......

 

[Zafiral]

Beware, I have heard that your caravan warranty may be voided by using a commercial vehicle to tow it. I'd check the paperwork.

 

[Neil_374459237]

Hmm interesting comment about warranty, not really applicable as it is 4 years old. But out of interest why would that be the case?

 

[Pete & Ev]

Is there a difference in the tow ball height ?

 

[TD42]

A bit late with advice but I have series 5 champagne (2005)& a citroen c5 75kg max tow ball weight, I found it very difficult to get the van down to 75kg noseweight, I found that n/weight gauges were innacurate by as much as 10kg & resorted to using bathroom scales. get the van on level ground,measure the height from ground to the top of your towball,cut a length of broomstick to the same length, less the height of the scales. place broomstick on scales & insert into tow hitch (nail a square of hardboard to end of broomstick for stability & to protect scales)This will give a reliable noseweight reading. compare reading to the that of the noseweight guage.

I found that I had to remove 1 gas bottle & nearly all other stuff such as awning,loungers ect had to be transfered to the car (do'nt put heavy weights to the rear of the van in order to achieve a low noseweight) as I found that it causes instability.

make sure that the toilet & hotwater tank is empty

hope this is of help

T D

 

[ProfJohnL]

Good advice from Tony,

But with regard to the towing of caravan behind commercial vans, The following explanations was give to a company I worked for.

The suspension on commercial vehicles is stiffer and less compliant than on saloon cars, the induced vibrations from the road and vehicle can be transmitted back through the ball and hitch and produce more viperous accelerations within the caravan.

I have also seen a comment to the effect that a when using a commercial vehicle the ball should be fitted on a compliant or anti vibration assembly.

I would actually question whether such a clause is justified, when many of the caravan delivery companies collect and tow caravan behind commercial vehicles.