Tow car & Payload

[Lenny_mc]

Hi All, newbie to Caravans here, although I have had motorhomes for several years. I have a question on tow cars that I was looking for guidance on.

My question is around car payloads. When I used the motorhome, I used to bring a small 750kg trailer with me, which swallowed all of the associated bits n bobs for >3 week camping holidays in France. Earlier this year, I bought a Bailey Unicorn Vigo, with 1500KG MTPLM. Current tow car is a BMW X6, which tows really well.

First time away in the caravan a couple of weeks ago, so I weight everything up, and weighed empty caravan & car at local weighbridge to figure out actual payload. After adding a full tank of fuel and passengers, I calculated an allowed payload of ~300KGs across both carvan and car. When I weighed the stuff we normally carried with the trailer, it came in at about 420KGS. So, by my calculations, I need a car with a payload of 700ish KG including full tank of fuel, passengers and all associated bits!

I was wondring if there were any recomendations on cars with a really good payload, that will tow the Bailey, in reasonable comfort, without exceeding DVGW. I have towing licence so no constraints there! My research says Ford Galaxy and Hyundai Santa Fe should work before I get into vans and pick ups.

Appreciate any feedback or guidance.
thanks

 

[Tobes]

Hi All, newbie to Caravans here, although I have had motorhomes for several years. I have a question on tow cars that I was looking for guidance on.

My question is around car payloads. When I used the motorhome, I used to bring a small 750kg trailer with me, which swallowed all of the associated bits n bobs for >3 week camping holidays in France. Earlier this year, I bought a Bailey Unicorn Vigo, with 1500KG MTPLM. Current tow car is a BMW X6, which tows really well.

First time away in the caravan a couple of weeks ago, so I weight everything up, and weighed empty caravan & car at local weighbridge to figure out actual payload. After adding a full tank of fuel and passengers, I calculated an allowed payload of ~300KGs across both carvan and car. When I weighed the stuff we normally carried with the trailer, it came in at about 420KGS. So, by my calculations, I need a car with a payload of 700ish KG including full tank of fuel, passengers and all associated bits!

I was wondring if there were any recomendations on cars with a really good payload, that will tow the Bailey, in reasonable comfort, without exceeding DVGW. I have towing licence so no constraints there! My research says Ford Galaxy and Hyundai Santa Fe should work before I get into vans and pick ups.

Appreciate any feedback or guidance.
thanks

Hi Lenny. Welcome!

We have 2016 Unicorn Vigo. The origional sticker by the door says the MTPLM is 1500, but if you look in the gas locker, you will find a weight plate that actually says 1550. For £50 Bailey will send you a new sticker for the door to get you up to 1550kg MTPLM (which we did before getting advice from here), or you can ignore the door sticker and with the gas locker number and save the £50.

We took our Vigo to a weigh bridge and discovered it was at 1480kg with our general kit in. A rigorous process of weighing everything and deciding if we needed it ensued, and we got the can down to a base weigh of 1389kg. That gives a Caravan payload of about 160kg.

Our car has an empty kerb weight of 2,227 (including options like the tow bar, driver @75kg and fluids). The max gross weight towing is 2690 giving us a payload of 462kg, from which we also have to accommodate nose weight of the caravan.

Gross train weigh of the car is 4100kg, so we have a total payload of something like 484kg (4100 - 2227 - 1389) to split between car and caravan to stay inside the total train weight.

We use a spreadsheet to track the weight of things going into the van, or car, and have simple red / green calculation that lets us know if we are save and legal or not.

You reminded me - I need to up date the spreadsheet for our new tow car (not tried it yet)

 

[Lenny_mc]

Thanks Tobes! Yes, spreadsheets are great.
Didnt know that about the up-weighting on the baily. Must investigate.

I have done the detailed weighing of everything - wife thought I was mad. LOL. I really love the x6 as a tow car, so I wonder if I could replace heavier stuff with lighter stuff, would that work.

 

[Tobes]

Thanks Tobes! Yes, spreadsheets are great.
Didnt know that about the up-weighting on the baily. Must investigate.

I have done the detailed weighing of everything - wife thought I was mad. LOL. I really love the x6 as a tow car, so I wonder if I could replace heavier stuff with lighter stuff, would that work.

Yes - a simple (though not cheap) saving is to replace the lead acid leisure battery with a Lithium Ion one. Our old Lead acid was a 110ah Banner Energy bull, weighing 24.1kg. We replaced with a Kempower LiFePo4 100ah (which has more real world capacity) weighing 10.24kg. A huge saving. Gas bottles are another place to look. We switched to the FloGas Gas light bottles. The weight of the actual bottle for a 5kg gas load is much less than a Calor bottle for 3.7kg gas load. If you carry 2, there is a big saving there too (about 5kg per bottle).

 

[RogerL]

Yes - a simple (though not cheap) saving is to replace the lead acid leisure battery with a Lithium Ion one. Our old Lead acid was a 110ah Banner Energy bull, weighing 24.1kg. We replaced with a Kempower LiFePo4 100ah (which has more real world capacity) weighing 10.24kg. A huge saving. Gas bottles are another place to look. We switched to the FloGas Gas light bottles. The weight of the actual bottle for a 5kg gas load is much less than a Calor bottle for 3.7kg gas load. If you carry 2, there is a big saving there too (about 5kg per bottle).

For those who usually caravan at sites with electric hook-up it's possible to save weight with lower cost - a much smaller car-type battery will suffice in many circumstances, even if a mover is used - fridge, heating and hot water can all be run on electric so many can get away with just taking one gas cylinder.

 

[otherclive]

I used home weighing and input to spreadsheets various. The spreadsheets could be divided into various types of trip IE long weekend summer, four weeks France, winter week or short week etc. Then prior to each trip I would select the nearest sub spreadsheet, name and date it IE Beacons June 2015, then I would go through selecting stuff to go or not to go. Print it off and give a copy to my wife for her bits too. Made life so much easier.

 

[ProfJohnL]

Spread sheets are one way to keep a handle on the weight of your outfit, but there is a risk of cumulative errors creeping in which might edge you over the cars GTM (Gross Train Mass) or the GVM (Gross Vehicle Mass) or the caravans MTPLM. Consequently you should verify your calculations by actually measuring the full outfit with all luggage driver and passengers.