Dinghy Towing Questions

[Gary RVRoamer]

Originally Posted by Tlccan10

1) Is there issues with towing an SUV with all wheel drive or 4 wheel drive.(live in Canada with bad winters)
2) Is there a certain size of vehicle were you need a braking unit for the dinghy brake petal.
3) Are the wiring harness for baseplate hard to install into existing wiring.

Any other recommendation would be appreciated.

1) Not all 4WD or AWD vehicles are towable 4-down (all wheels on the pavement), so make sure the ones you like are towable. The owners manuals will have a section on dinghy towing or recreational towing that advises No or Yes and the procedure if Yes. Some are very easy (push a button) and some may take more effort.


2) There are weight constraints - check your provincial towing laws - but for practical purposes every towed car should have an auxiliary brake system. Regardless of the laws, having a toad brake system shortens the stopping distance significantly.


3) Wiring for brake/turn/tail lights when towing is generally simple enough as such things go, but if you have never worked with trailer or car light wiring it can be mystifying. Since you asked the question, I suspect you would be best off having a hitch shop install the wiring.

[hatrock]

Sorry if this has been covered previously in this thread. My searches returned nothing specific so I am posting this.

Who is towing a dinghy four-down with a 24' Winnebago Class C with Sprinter chassis? What vehicle do you tow and how much does it weigh?

Thanks.

[ThomB]

Originally Posted by hatrock

Sorry if this has been covered previously in this thread. My searches returned nothing specific so I am posting this.

Who is towing a dinghy four-down with a 24' Winnebago Class C with Sprinter chassis? What vehicle do you tow and how much does it weigh?

Thanks.

That's probably a question that begs it's own forum thread. It's a bit more specific than the general question of what would be needed. You'll want to include your tow capacity, etc.

I personally tow a Mini Cooper Roadster S that weighs just north of 2500lbs. Pretty much anything can probably tow it. It is a manual transmission if that matters to you.

[johninsd]

Originally Posted by hatrock

Sorry if this has been covered previously in this thread. My searches returned nothing specific so I am posting this.

Who is towing a dinghy four-down with a 24' Winnebago Class C with Sprinter chassis? What vehicle do you tow and how much does it weigh?

Thanks.

I tow a 3800 pound Jeep Wrangler with a 2015 chassis 2016 Itasca Navion (Sprinter with 3.0 liter diesel, 5 speed auto).


Mileage drops from about 15 to about 13 and steep climbs are slow but I usually pass the eighteen wheelers and everything else passes me, for instance climbing up to the Eisenhower Tunnel from the west side I was limited to about 40 mph. I did get a Scan Gauge and use it to keep an eye on the transmission fluid temperature, have seen a max of about 235F. Got a fluid sample analyzed by Blackstone Labs and it came back normal, no sign of burning.

I use a Ready Brute Elite with the built in cable operated brake and it works great.

[Unplanned Tourist]

To the OP, I tow my 2010 Ranger 2WD manual trans. 4 down.

Since you have a gasser like me, keeping the weight down for your toad is a great idea. (Lots of hills here in BC)

The Ranger tips the scales at 3500 pounds.

With it loaded up, it's never over 4000 pounds.

I am a bit of a cheap guy, and do all my own work, so I built my tow brackets and use a $60.00 Princess Auto tow bar.

I bought a used old style Brake Buddy that can be used in anything, just need to wire up the break-away switch.

Hope you get something that works for you. Just be sure to get a good brake system with a break-away on it.

If for some reason your toad comes un-hooked, you want it to stop!

Happy Glamping.

[vseasport]

Originally Posted by ThomB

That's probably a question that begs it's own forum thread. It's a bit more specific than the general question of what would be needed. You'll want to include your tow capacity, etc.

I personally tow a Mini Cooper Roadster S that weighs just north of 2500lbs. Pretty much anything can probably tow it. It is a manual transmission if that matters to you.

ThomB, I just purchased a 2014 Mini Cooper S 2 door and installed a Roadmanster base plate and diode kit for brake lights. Also purchased a Roadmaster Falcon ll tow bar. Now I'm looking at supplemental brake options.

The install of the Baseplate and diodes was a little time consuming but Roadmaster's video was straight forward and made it easy.

My question is how difficult was it to install the Ready Brake cable in your Mini? Their install instructions are very general.