A few days ago I watched a Canberra small business spend 3-hours with a caravanner weighing the tow vehicle and caravan and putting it all together as a picture for the clients - the caravan owners. And I was most impressed by it all
The caravan and tow vehicle arrived at the test location and I watched the testers setup the 4-weighing panels for the still-connected caravan and tow vehicle. As a combination, each unit was less than 12-months old and the clients / owners were looking forward to many years of happy travels as the children continued growing
The testers recorded front axle and rear axle weights, then moved to the caravan's two axles. After disconnecting the caravan they again weighed the tow vehicle to determine changes there, followed by the weighing of the tow ball. There may have been more stuff undertaken as well that I missed
The clients made it quite clear that the van was fully loaded ready to hit-the-road, even to the effect that their two children were patiently sitting in the rear of the tow vehicle during this entire exercise. One was upper primary school age - the other early high school ... ie- each has some growing to do while the family has the next few years with the van enjoying their holidays
When it was all done, the testers put it together with the tow vehicle and caravan's respective manufactures figures and determined the overall 'score'.
What surprised them (and me as a fly on the wall) is that the tow vehicle only had 5kg spare between its current weight vs the manufacturer's designated rear-axle weight. Obviously that will soon vanish as the children grow a bit bigger.
The van as weighed had a tow-ball weight of 9%, but the owner mentioned that the water tank was empty. Adding a notional weight for a filled water tank then put the towball weight into the 10% range, so everyone was happy again
I was not present for the conclusion discussions between the testers and the owners, but I am sure that the "another 5kg and you're overweight" stuff would have been at the forefront of those matters
Overall, three hours of careful operations by the testers, plenty of discussions and diagrams with the clients regarding vehicles and axle weights and a full written report at the end, and as I said above, I was most impressed
For reference for anyone in or near Canberra, the testers were Capital Vehicle Weighing and no doubt you will find them on-line should you wish to use their services
I have no involvement with them, I just happened to be a fly on the wall Phil
If I get time later today I will point out a couple of glaringly obvious errors. Cheers
FMC said
07:39 AM Mar 17, 2023
Been there done that, the moral of the story is I can leave home without wine or beer or water in the van along with the small Webber, leave the missus home and don't fill up the standard reserve fuel tank on the 100 series nor take the car fridge.
Happy holiday
RickJ said
08:09 AM Mar 17, 2023
It appears that they offer a good service.
The more aware the average caravaner is with regard to vehicle / trailer weight and balanced loading the safer we all will be on the roads.
This type of business along with some advanced driver instruction (or dare I mention, licensing) will do a lot to ensure all caravaners are doing it safely provided those operating such vehicles take advantage of the advice and training that is becoming available.
A great post Ozzie Traveller..thank you.
Trailer Sailer said
08:30 AM Mar 17, 2023
Thanks for the post. Any idea what the process cost? Love to find someone with a similar service in South Australia as have a slide on camper on a small truck towing a very big cruising equipped trailer sailer and would like to check all my weights.
If the cost is important anyone could just do it all themselves on a public weighbridge.
Of course it goes without saying that you will need to know all limitations and all facts of the regulations relating to your combination of vehicles.
kgarnett said
10:06 AM Mar 17, 2023
"What surprised them (and me as a fly on the wall) is that the tow vehicle only had 5kg spare between its current weight vs the manufacturer's designated rear-axle weight. Obviously that will soon vanish as the children grow a bit bigger.
The van as weighed had a tow-ball weight of 9%, but the owner mentioned that the water tank was empty. Adding a notional weight for a filled water tank then put the towball weight into the 10% range, so everyone was happy again"
Increasing the ball weight by filling the water tanks would undoubtedly increase the rear axle weight in excess of the manufacturers designated rear axle weight so no reason to be happy !
Thank you for your enquiry regarding our weighing costs and services.
We weigh caravans, vehicles, trailers, boats, trucks and more, all over South Australia.
The reports provided are very comprehensive and we take the time to ensure that you clearly understand your
weights. We make recommendations to ensure your compliance to all legal requirements. We also advise, where
appropriate, how to have a new compliance plate fitted with increased maximum weight allowance while hitched
and not hitched (GTM and ATM). This can often be done with no costs incurred by any parties.
We charge:
$275 for two units that being the tow vehicle and caravan/trailer/boat
$225 for one unit that being a vehicle only or trailer/caravan/boat only
Pricing can be higher in some country areas
There are seven weights that we compare to your legal requirements to form your report:
ü The gross vehicle weight GVM
ü The vehicle gross weight including trailer GCM
ü The vehicle towing capacity BTC
ü The vehicle front and rear axle capacity FGAWR and RGAWR
ü The trailers allowable total weight while not hitched ATM
ü The trailers allowable weight while hitched GTM
ü The tow ball weight TBM
As well as these, we also weigh each wheel of the vehicle and trailer separately which gives a valuable and accurate
record of how the vehicle/trailer internal load is distributed which has a direct influence on your driving safety.
Please note: We consider the public weighbridge to be of value to the commercial sector but owing to their
calibration increments, they often do not provide the accurate readings required, particularly by the
caravanning/boating public.
Because we are a mobile weighing service. we come to you!
Please call me on 0418 229 229 so we can arrange a suitable time. Cheers Martin
Possum3 said
06:37 PM Mar 17, 2023
The service provided by yourmobileweighbridge.com.au would represent a fair price for the services offered although most public weighbridges can do all the weighing at around $25.00 a pop.
BarneyBDB said
07:18 PM Mar 17, 2023
No association with them, just passing on the info, while a public weighbridge may give you a reasonable amount of confidence, having individual weights for each wheel etc can be much more informative for those that know what to do with the numbers generated.
I may be biased, I have a background that involved weighing multiple types of aircraft and also needing to carry out before flight weight and balance calculations on various helicopters and other aircraft.
nomadz said
08:54 PM Mar 17, 2023
Hi,
We used yourmobileWeighbridge in Adelaide on our way back from WA.
Martin on 0418229229 We were fairly sure we were very close to the legal limits and decided to bite the bullet on the way back home.
We camped the night before and filled all water tanks and filled up with diesel. We had all our gear from being away for the past 5 months prospecting and touring, so we were as heavy as we were ever going to be. Would like to be able to boast that it was the gold that added all the weight but!!
Martin met us at a large car park at Main North Rd, Parafield
The whole process took about 1 hour and we were given written reports as well as some advice. A very professional operation.
Cost was $275 for that but substantially more for what resulted from it!!
As a result of this, we subsequently had a Lovells 4200kg upgrade and had the caravan re rated by an approved engineer.(the cvan always had the extra capacity but not shown on the registration papers.)
We are now legal with both the L/cruiser and the caravan.
Regards,
Ian
The Belmont Bear said
01:10 PM Mar 18, 2023
We had our rig done here in Lake Macquarie last September by a moblle service called Auswide Weighing Services prior to us leaving on a 3 month trip through Qld. We organised to meet them at a local club car park with the van and car fully loaded as it would be when we left home (inc. full water tanks, fuel tank, gas bottles etc.) We weighed in with the both of us sitting in the car and were pretty relieved when everything came back well within the limits we even had some room to spare. The only issue we had was we were a bit light on the towball so we had to redistribute some of the load in order to raise it, that meant things like swapping heavier items from the car to the tunnel boot and lifting our towball a notch higher in the rack which surprisingly added 7.5kg. We were still on the scales so we knew exactly what the impact of each change we made had on the readings. One of the most useful things they did was to place a 10kg test weight in different locations and show us what change that weight made to the scale readings. eg. 10kg added to the rear bumper took 6kg off the towball and added 16kg to the vans wheels. Just opening the door which is behind the wheels and swinging it back took 2kg off the towball. 10kg added to the front toolbox went 6kg to the towball and 4kg to the vans wheels, adding it to the gas bottles in front of the toolbox was 7kg and 3kg. As part of their final report they gave us a map of the van so we would have an idea what effect adding or removing weight in different locations would be. The people who owned the buisness were a couple with a young family who were intending on setting out on a lap a few weeks after they did our weigh, they said that they were taking their scales and equipment with them and hopefully they could pick up some buisness along the way to offset their costs.. I'm glad that we spent the money to get it done not just because we found a problem with the ball weight and corrected it but also for the piece of mind it gave us knowing that we would be legal..
BB
Trailer Sailer said
02:34 PM Mar 18, 2023
Thanks heaps for the info. I will contact them and ask how much to come to Welling East SA.
BarneyBDB said
03:31 PM Mar 18, 2023
Might be worth asking them for the caravan show discount, I think it was $45 off.
littledick said
04:21 PM Mar 18, 2023
Ours went over the weighbridge no charge. For those unsure of their weights, probably in excess of $300.00 for private testing.
Not required in our present situation. 500kls under.
And DON'T over load ute to the max. Sick of the comments utes can't tow 3.5T.
Dick.
-- Edited by littledick on Saturday 18th of March 2023 04:24:54 PM
-- Edited by littledick on Saturday 18th of March 2023 04:25:30 PM
Southern Cruizer said
05:08 PM Mar 18, 2023
Saw a Landcruiser tray ute come through our home town this morning with an off road camper trailer behind it and so help me the front of vehicle and driving lights were pointing towards any low flying aircraft that may have possibly passing by. Certainly not a good look, and guessing if he had a van behind and same gear on board he would have been a ton over
yobarr said
06:10 PM Mar 18, 2023
littledick wrote:
Ours went over the weighbridge no charge. For those unsure of their weights, probably in excess of $300.00 for private testing.
Not required in our present situation. 500kls under.
And DON'T over load ute to the max. Sick of comments utes can't tow 3,5T
Dick.
Unfortunately for you NONE of the more popular twin-cab utes can safely tow 3500kg as a PIG trailer. NONE.
Top weight for those like the Ranger,with 3200kg GVM is 3100-3200kg ATM. Not negotiable.Cheers
-- Edited by yobarr on Saturday 18th of March 2023 06:22:08 PM
Trailer Sailer said
06:57 PM Mar 18, 2023
Contacted the above recommended company for weighing my rig and was quoted $350 with going to Goolwa ( about an 1.5 hour return journey) and an additional $240 for them to come to me making $590. Thats getting a bit rich I feel. I think I will go to a public weighbridge and try to do the best I can. I may not know specific axle weights and the like but will know if my 4500gvm vehicle with 8000gcm is legal of not with everything onboard. :(
yobarr said
07:29 PM Mar 18, 2023
Trailer Sailer wrote:
Contacted the above recommended company for weighing my rig and was quoted $350 with going to Goolwa ( about an 1.5 hour return journey) and an additional $240 for them to come to me making $590. Thats getting a bit rich I feel. I think I will go to a public weighbridge and try to do the best I can. I may not know specific axle weights and the like but will know if my 4500gvm vehicle with 8000gcm is legal of not with everything onboard. :(
Hi Graeme. Happy to talk you through it while you're at weighbridge. Simple stuff but I'd need your vehicle model etc to find axle weights. Cheers
Trailer Sailer said
09:23 PM Mar 18, 2023
Hi Yobarr
Thanks.:) Any assistance is always appreciated. I have a pretty good idea of things like my axle weight capabilities etc and these generally are well within limits as my vehicle is a 2021 Isuzu NLS AWD car licensed light truck with for instance a 5 ton rated rear axle from memory which is way over capable of my requirements. My primary concerns are the fully loaded weight of my truck and trailer towing the very big heavily equipped cruising yacht when the truck is also loaded with my heavy fully loaded extra high roof hard sided slide on camper which was custom built Beyond unit designed for a VW Transporter Light Truck. I understand adding trailer ball weight ( approx 320kgs ) to the total unit weight and have a GVM of 4500kgs and a GCM of 8000kgs to fit within. My concern revolves around being a bit of a take everything possibly necessary type person and heading off on very extended travels and just what I should leave unloaded until destination. For instance I have 230 litres of water capacity on the yacht along with 280 litres of fuel carrying capacity. Its difficult to have the yachts 140 primary fuel tank fairly empty or to drain it due to its low down and hidden location. Regarding the yachts water however I have just fitted an external shower unit to the slide on camper with a long enough hose to reach my yachts water tank filler. My intention was to run the yacht fairly lean on water and dump the campers entire water supply into it when setting off to sail. I am considering doubling my camper/ trucks water carrying capacity to facilitate this. Filling the 140 litres of unleaded extra carry containers in some very remote location could be very expensive but may be required to keep the yachts trailerable weight down. Balancing extensive provisions and long range cruising equipment between the camper and the yacht is the other issue I am looking to understand. My yachts trailer was a little overbuilt and is easily the required 3.5ton limit capable but I need to stay within this for legal reasons.
Typical! You upgrade your towing vehicle to carry more legally so you carry more! :)
littledick said
07:48 AM Mar 19, 2023
yobarr wrote:
littledick wrote:
Ours went over the weighbridge no charge. For those unsure of their weights, probably in excess of $300.00 for private testing.
Not required in our present situation. 500kls under.
And DON'T over load ute to the max. Sick of comments utes can't tow 3,5T
Dick.
Unfortunately for you NONE of the more popular twin-cab utes can safely tow 3500kg as a PIG trailer. NONE.
Top weight for those like the Ranger,with 3200kg GVM is 3100-3200kg ATM. Not negotiable.Cheers
-- Edited by yobarr on Saturday 18th of March 2023 06:22:08 PM
I would never tow 3.5T.
And how did I know you would comment!!
Dick.
Ozzie_Traveller said
10:29 AM Mar 19, 2023
kgarnett wrote:
"What surprised them (and me as a fly on the wall) is that the tow vehicle only had 5kg spare between its current weight vs the manufacturer's designated rear-axle weight. Obviously that will soon vanish as the children grow a bit bigger.
The van as weighed had a tow-ball weight of 9%, but the owner mentioned that the water tank was empty. Adding a notional weight for a filled water tank then put the towball weight into the 10% range, so everyone was happy again"
Increasing the ball weight by filling the water tanks would undoubtedly increase the rear axle weight in excess of the manufacturers designated rear axle weight so no reason to be happy !
G'day mate
Please don't take offence -- but such comments from armchair experts who were not present are not helpful
The empty water tank WAS IN FRONT OF THE TWIN AXLES and thus when notionally added its 100-Ltres / 100-kg into the grand total it REALLY DID take the ball weight to 10%
Phil
Ozzie_Traveller said
10:35 AM Mar 19, 2023
G'day all
To all above who read the O.P. and responded intelligently, may I thank you The post was done to simply alert people to an ACT-based small business doing what appeared to be "a beaut job"
While others here also refer to a local public weighbridge (which I personally use for my motorhome before every 1-month or longer trip) it is so busy with commercial users that I cannot see a caravanner using it for 2 to 3 hours carefully weighing each of the axles of the tow vehicle and caravan without getting some heat from others who need a qwik response from the weighbridge so that they can continue getting paid for their working day
Phil
kgarnett said
02:04 PM Mar 19, 2023
Ozzie_Traveller wrote:
G'day mate
Please don't take offence -- but such comments from armchair experts who were not present are not helpful
The empty water tank WAS IN FRONT OF THE TWIN AXLES and thus when notionally added its 100-Ltres / 100-kg into the grand total it REALLY DID take the ball weight to 10%
Phil
Precisely my point.
If the ball weight increased from 9% to 10% of the van weight this would mean an increase ball weight of 25kg for a nominal 2500kg van.
The effect of an increase of 25kg ball weight would be more than 25kg increase in rear axle load.
It was stated that the tow vehicle only had 5kg spare between its current weight vs the manufacturer's designated rear-axle weight.
Thus increasing the ball weight to 10% would cause the rear axle load to increase beyond the 5kg available and hence be over its designated rating and no reason to be happy.
In general I believe these caravan weighing services do a great job and more people should use their services.
Ken
yobarr said
02:27 PM Mar 19, 2023
kgarnett wrote:
Ozzie_Traveller wrote:
G'day mate
Please don't take offence -- but such comments from armchair experts who were not present are not helpful
The empty water tank WAS IN FRONT OF THE TWIN AXLES and thus when notionally added its 100-Ltres / 100-kg into the grand total it REALLY DID take the ball weight to 10%
Phil
Precisely my point.
If the ball weight increased from 9% to 10% of the van weight this would mean an increase ball weight of 25kg for a nominal 2500kg van.
The effect of an increase of 25kg ball weight would be more than 25kg increase in rear axle load.
It was stated that the tow vehicle only had 5kg spare between its current weight vs the manufacturer's designated rear-axle weight.
Thus increasing the ball weight to 10% would cause the rear axle load to increase beyond the 5kg available and hence be over its designated rating and no reason to be happy.
In general I believe these caravan weighing services do a great job and more people should use their services.
Ken
Common sense Ken, and one of the things I was going to point out. Rear axle weight would increase by around 35kg, so way over limit. Could even exceed GVM? And that's just to start, but at least these guys are "having a go". Good on 'em. Cheers
-- Edited by yobarr on Sunday 19th of March 2023 02:52:08 PM
tea spoon said
05:00 PM Apr 11, 2023
i went to the local sand amd metal place and weighed the 1974 //12 foot franklin after i renoed it ........the rego said 650 the true weight is 720 and i pulled out the old 3 way fridge and i weighed every thing i put in so as not to increase the amount ......i do have an air con sticking out the van rear of 39 k ....and i removed the water tank as well .......im happy with the weight of it as i can tow 1200 kilos only ........
A few days ago I watched a Canberra small business spend 3-hours with a caravanner weighing the tow vehicle and caravan and putting it all together as a picture for the clients - the caravan owners. And I was most impressed by it all
The caravan and tow vehicle arrived at the test location and I watched the testers setup the 4-weighing panels for the still-connected caravan and tow vehicle. As a combination, each unit was less than 12-months old and the clients / owners were looking forward to many years of happy travels as the children continued growing
The testers recorded front axle and rear axle weights, then moved to the caravan's two axles. After disconnecting the caravan they again weighed the tow vehicle to determine changes there, followed by the weighing of the tow ball. There may have been more stuff undertaken as well that I missed
The clients made it quite clear that the van was fully loaded ready to hit-the-road, even to the effect that their two children were patiently sitting in the rear of the tow vehicle during this entire exercise. One was upper primary school age - the other early high school ... ie- each has some growing to do while the family has the next few years with the van enjoying their holidays
When it was all done, the testers put it together with the tow vehicle and caravan's respective manufactures figures and determined the overall 'score'.
What surprised them (and me as a fly on the wall) is that the tow vehicle only had 5kg spare between its current weight vs the manufacturer's designated rear-axle weight. Obviously that will soon vanish as the children grow a bit bigger.
The van as weighed had a tow-ball weight of 9%, but the owner mentioned that the water tank was empty. Adding a notional weight for a filled water tank then put the towball weight into the 10% range, so everyone was happy again
I was not present for the conclusion discussions between the testers and the owners, but I am sure that the "another 5kg and you're overweight" stuff would have been at the forefront of those matters
Overall, three hours of careful operations by the testers, plenty of discussions and diagrams with the clients regarding vehicles and axle weights and a full written report at the end, and as I said above, I was most impressed
For reference for anyone in or near Canberra, the testers were Capital Vehicle Weighing and no doubt you will find them on-line should you wish to use their services
I have no involvement with them, I just happened to be a fly on the wall
Phil
If I get time later today I will point out a couple of glaringly obvious errors. Cheers
Been there done that, the moral of the story is I can leave home without wine or beer or water in the van along with the small Webber, leave the missus home and don't fill up the standard reserve fuel tank on the 100 series nor take the car fridge.
Happy holiday
The more aware the average caravaner is with regard to vehicle / trailer weight and balanced loading the safer we all will be on the roads.
This type of business along with some advanced driver instruction (or dare I mention, licensing) will do a lot to ensure all caravaners are doing it safely provided those operating such vehicles take advantage of the advice and training that is becoming available.
A great post Ozzie Traveller..thank you.
Thanks for the post. Any idea what the process cost? Love to find someone with a similar service in South Australia as have a slide on camper on a small truck towing a very big cruising equipped trailer sailer and would like to check all my weights.
Of course it goes without saying that you will need to know all limitations and all facts of the regulations relating to your combination of vehicles.
"What surprised them (and me as a fly on the wall) is that the tow vehicle only had 5kg spare between its current weight vs the manufacturer's designated rear-axle weight. Obviously that will soon vanish as the children grow a bit bigger.
The van as weighed had a tow-ball weight of 9%, but the owner mentioned that the water tank was empty. Adding a notional weight for a filled water tank then put the towball weight into the 10% range, so everyone was happy again"
Increasing the ball weight by filling the water tanks would undoubtedly increase the rear axle weight in excess of the manufacturers designated rear axle weight so no reason to be happy !
Thank you for your enquiry regarding our weighing costs and services.
We weigh caravans, vehicles, trailers, boats, trucks and more, all over South Australia.
The reports provided are very comprehensive and we take the time to ensure that you clearly understand your
weights. We make recommendations to ensure your compliance to all legal requirements. We also advise, where
appropriate, how to have a new compliance plate fitted with increased maximum weight allowance while hitched
and not hitched (GTM and ATM). This can often be done with no costs incurred by any parties.
We charge:
$275 for two units that being the tow vehicle and caravan/trailer/boat
$225 for one unit that being a vehicle only or trailer/caravan/boat only
Pricing can be higher in some country areas
There are seven weights that we compare to your legal requirements to form your report:
ü The gross vehicle weight GVM
ü The vehicle gross weight including trailer GCM
ü The vehicle towing capacity BTC
ü The vehicle front and rear axle capacity FGAWR and RGAWR
ü The trailers allowable total weight while not hitched ATM
ü The trailers allowable weight while hitched GTM
ü The tow ball weight TBM
As well as these, we also weigh each wheel of the vehicle and trailer separately which gives a valuable and accurate
record of how the vehicle/trailer internal load is distributed which has a direct influence on your driving safety.
Please note: We consider the public weighbridge to be of value to the commercial sector but owing to their
calibration increments, they often do not provide the accurate readings required, particularly by the
caravanning/boating public.
Because we are a mobile weighing service. we come to you!
Please call me on 0418 229 229 so we can arrange a suitable time. Cheers Martin
I may be biased, I have a background that involved weighing multiple types of aircraft and also needing to carry out before flight weight and balance calculations on various helicopters and other aircraft.
Hi,
We used yourmobileWeighbridge in Adelaide on our way back from WA.
Martin on 0418229229
We were fairly sure we were very close to the legal limits and decided to bite the bullet on the way back home.
We camped the night before and filled all water tanks and filled up with diesel. We had all our gear from being away for the past 5 months prospecting and touring, so we were as heavy as we were ever going to be. Would like to be able to boast that it was the gold that added all the weight but!!
Martin met us at a large car park at Main North Rd, Parafield
The whole process took about 1 hour and we were given written reports as well as some advice. A very professional operation.
Cost was $275 for that but substantially more for what resulted from it!!
As a result of this, we subsequently had a Lovells 4200kg upgrade and had the caravan re rated by an approved engineer.(the cvan always had the extra capacity but not shown on the registration papers.)
We are now legal with both the L/cruiser and the caravan.
Regards,
Ian
We had our rig done here in Lake Macquarie last September by a moblle service called Auswide Weighing Services prior to us leaving on a 3 month trip through Qld. We organised to meet them at a local club car park with the van and car fully loaded as it would be when we left home (inc. full water tanks, fuel tank, gas bottles etc.) We weighed in with the both of us sitting in the car and were pretty relieved when everything came back well within the limits we even had some room to spare. The only issue we had was we were a bit light on the towball so we had to redistribute some of the load in order to raise it, that meant things like swapping heavier items from the car to the tunnel boot and lifting our towball a notch higher in the rack which surprisingly added 7.5kg. We were still on the scales so we knew exactly what the impact of each change we made had on the readings. One of the most useful things they did was to place a 10kg test weight in different locations and show us what change that weight made to the scale readings. eg. 10kg added to the rear bumper took 6kg off the towball and added 16kg to the vans wheels. Just opening the door which is behind the wheels and swinging it back took 2kg off the towball. 10kg added to the front toolbox went 6kg to the towball and 4kg to the vans wheels, adding it to the gas bottles in front of the toolbox was 7kg and 3kg. As part of their final report they gave us a map of the van so we would have an idea what effect adding or removing weight in different locations would be. The people who owned the buisness were a couple with a young family who were intending on setting out on a lap a few weeks after they did our weigh, they said that they were taking their scales and equipment with them and hopefully they could pick up some buisness along the way to offset their costs.. I'm glad that we spent the money to get it done not just because we found a problem with the ball weight and corrected it but also for the piece of mind it gave us knowing that we would be legal..
BB
Thanks heaps for the info. I will contact them and ask how much to come to Welling East SA.
Ours went over the weighbridge no charge. For those unsure of their weights, probably in excess of $300.00 for private testing.
Not required in our present situation. 500kls under.
And DON'T over load ute to the max. Sick of the comments utes can't tow 3.5T.
Dick.
-- Edited by littledick on Saturday 18th of March 2023 04:24:54 PM
-- Edited by littledick on Saturday 18th of March 2023 04:25:30 PM
Unfortunately for you NONE of the more popular twin-cab utes can safely tow 3500kg as a PIG trailer. NONE.
Top weight for those like the Ranger,with 3200kg GVM is 3100-3200kg ATM. Not negotiable.Cheers
-- Edited by yobarr on Saturday 18th of March 2023 06:22:08 PM
Hi Graeme. Happy to talk you through it while you're at weighbridge. Simple stuff but I'd need your vehicle model etc to find axle weights. Cheers
Hi Yobarr
Thanks.:) Any assistance is always appreciated.
I have a pretty good idea of things like my axle weight capabilities etc and these generally are well within limits as my vehicle is a 2021 Isuzu NLS AWD car licensed light truck with for instance a 5 ton rated rear axle from memory which is way over capable of my requirements.
My primary concerns are the fully loaded weight of my truck and trailer towing the very big heavily equipped cruising yacht when the truck is also loaded with my heavy fully loaded extra high roof hard sided slide on camper which was custom built Beyond unit designed for a VW Transporter Light Truck.
I understand adding trailer ball weight ( approx 320kgs ) to the total unit weight and have a GVM of 4500kgs and a GCM of 8000kgs to fit within.
My concern revolves around being a bit of a take everything possibly necessary type person and heading off on very extended travels and just what I should leave unloaded until destination.
For instance I have 230 litres of water capacity on the yacht along with 280 litres of fuel carrying capacity.
Its difficult to have the yachts 140 primary fuel tank fairly empty or to drain it due to its low down and hidden location. Regarding the yachts water however I have just fitted an external shower unit to the slide on camper with a long enough hose to reach my yachts water tank filler. My intention was to run the yacht fairly lean on water and dump the campers entire water supply into it when setting off to sail.
I am considering doubling my camper/ trucks water carrying capacity to facilitate this.
Filling the 140 litres of unleaded extra carry containers in some very remote location could be very expensive but may be required to keep the yachts trailerable weight down.
Balancing extensive provisions and long range cruising equipment between the camper and the yacht is the other issue I am looking to understand.
My yachts trailer was a little overbuilt and is easily the required 3.5ton limit capable but I need to stay within this for legal reasons.
Typical! You upgrade your towing vehicle to carry more legally so you carry more! :)
I would never tow 3.5T.
And how did I know you would comment!!
Dick.
G'day mate
Please don't take offence -- but such comments from armchair experts who were not present are not helpful
The empty water tank WAS IN FRONT OF THE TWIN AXLES and thus when notionally added its 100-Ltres / 100-kg into the grand total it REALLY DID take the ball weight to 10%
Phil
G'day all
To all above who read the O.P. and responded intelligently, may I thank you
The post was done to simply alert people to an ACT-based small business doing what appeared to be "a beaut job"
While others here also refer to a local public weighbridge (which I personally use for my motorhome before every 1-month or longer trip) it is so busy with commercial users that I cannot see a caravanner using it for 2 to 3 hours carefully weighing each of the axles of the tow vehicle and caravan without getting some heat from others who need a qwik response from the weighbridge so that they can continue getting paid for their working day
Phil
Precisely my point.
If the ball weight increased from 9% to 10% of the van weight this would mean an increase ball weight of 25kg for a nominal 2500kg van.
The effect of an increase of 25kg ball weight would be more than 25kg increase in rear axle load.
It was stated that the tow vehicle only had 5kg spare between its current weight vs the manufacturer's designated rear-axle weight.
Thus increasing the ball weight to 10% would cause the rear axle load to increase beyond the 5kg available and hence be over its designated rating and no reason to be happy.
In general I believe these caravan weighing services do a great job and more people should use their services.
Ken
Common sense Ken, and one of the things I was going to point out. Rear axle weight would increase by around 35kg, so way over limit. Could even exceed GVM? And that's just to start, but at least these guys are "having a go". Good on 'em. Cheers
-- Edited by yobarr on Sunday 19th of March 2023 02:52:08 PM