Dollies?

[RalphR01]

My wife and I are full-timers for 2 years, though with only a handful of trips. We have a 2015 40' Ventana. Before getting into this lifestyle we pared down to 1 car - a Volvo XC, which we still have. With the move to the motorhome pulling the Volvo 4-down didn't seem to be an option so we got a dolly. Are we the only ones on the road? I never see any, and am wondering if we should bail and get a cheap car we can setup for Blue Ox or equivalent. All suggestions welcomed!!

[Chuck Q]

A Dolly is just another thing to worry about and deal with. I have pulled a 06 Ranger since day 1. Easy tow and worry free.

[twinboat]

Park in a I 95 rest area, during the northern or southern snowbird migration, and watch the RV and toads go by.

I'd guess about 35% to 40% are on dollies.
4 down towable " Cars " are getting rare.

[Americanrascal]

Love your dolly! We've towed both ways 4 down and a dolly. Dolly wins hands down for us. Used the dolly all the way from Georgia to Alaska and back- east to west coast x2, north to south X3. 60,000 miles and we really appreciate and love our dolly.

Had horrid experiences with 4 down. (watched the car try to pass us one time with 4 down- that was exciting)

[photopilot]

Aren’t the Volvo XC series all AWD? I didn’t think you could dolly tow an AWD car. Just curious. Did the dolly route at first, but flat towing is much easier in my experience.

Walt

[ThePowells]

Ralph, I am shocked at this thread. If you had posted on the Towing forum, you would have found out that the attitude there is pretty much if you aren't smart enough to understand the superiority of 4 down towing, then (fill in the blank).

[Massparanoia]

I tow a Chrysler Town & Country with an Acme dolly. It’s easy, and I didn’t want to risk damage by using a remco pump. Also, it was much cheaper to purchase the dolly than to outfit the van to tow 4 down.

[Crasher]

I've done it all. Towed with a dolly, 4 down, on a trailer and even with a kit that overfilled the transmission with an extra qt of oil. They all worked and accomplished the same thing. Each one got the car to the campsite with the motorhome with no damage and ready to drive. Each method has its advantage. If you are ok towing with a dolly, don't worry about what you see on the road or what others say about it. It works fine and it's what you have. If you like your Volvo, there's no need to spend money to conform to what some think you "Should" do. Just enjoy the lifestyle anyway you want.

[fcbbob15]

Don't worry about it. Do what works for you. We tow with a dolly and it works for use. As said before it's getting harder to find flat towable cars. We looked at getting a Jeep but after adding up all of the cost we decided what we have works so don't mess with it. May are paths cross,

[Mojim]

Originally Posted by RalphR01

My wife and I are full-timers for 2 years, though with only a handful of trips. We have a 2015 40' Ventana. Before getting into this lifestyle we pared down to 1 car - a Volvo XC, which we still have. With the move to the motorhome pulling the Volvo 4-down didn't seem to be an option so we got a dolly. Are we the only ones on the road? I never see any, and am wondering if we should bail and get a cheap car we can setup for Blue Ox or equivalent. All suggestions welcomed!!

you never see motorhomes pulling tow dollys ?

[EdInArk]

We use a dolly simply because our RAV-4 is not towable and we didn't want to have to trade cars. We do fine. The first couple of trips out were challenging, but we've worked out the kinks. It doesn't take us much longer to load / unload then my friends do hooking / unhooking. I've learned some tricks to make it a lot easier to get the car centered without all the backing and moving we used to have to do.

Storing the dolly at home is not an issue, but we've got 8 acres to mess with. In town, where we used to live, it would have been a PIA. We've never had a problem finding a place to put it at a campground. If we can get a pull through we just ... well ... pull through If not, we can usually just park it at the back of the space with no problem.

We park host and do see a lot more 4-down than dollies, but there are usually two or three in the campground at any given time.

[Gary RVRoamer]

I didn’t think you could dolly tow an AWD car.

Some (few) AWD can be towed 4-down, e.g. GMC Acadias and its Chevy siblings. It depends on the design of the AWD system.

[riverforest]

easy choice for me, Dolly. I already had a paid for/free and clear nissan cube with only 25,000 miles on it. It can't be towed 4 down. but I went down to the local jeep dealer just to fact check. A rubicon looked very attractive, and only $55,000.00 !!! so I ordered a $1,695. dolly and I now tow the cube. yeah, its more work but tows nice.

[Unplanned Tourist]

Maybe I'm doing something wrong, but I always liked towing my 2010 Ranger.
I bought a dolly and tried towing my wife's Mazda 3, that didn't go too well. I tried to turn as sharp as I normally would with the Ranger flat, and the fender of the dolly hit the Mazda body.
So, anyone in my area want a good dolly, cheap!
Happy Glamping.