'A' frame

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htr

htr

Well-Known Member
Posts
1,515
Location
Central Otago, Southern New Zealand
Has anyone made an A frame for towing a Freelander 1? Possibly towed behind a converted bus [ motorhome].

I'm wanting to make one myself and plans, measurements ... would be very welcome.

HTR
 
Aren't they 'on demand' 4WD i.e. when wheel slip / spin occurs the VCU locks and applies power/drive to the rear wheels?

But that's beside the point - I'm wanting to recover a dead FL 1 manual and want to avoid carting a trailer around the country. An A frame would fit inside my vehicle, wouldn't be expensive to make up... A transport company wants as much as the vehicle cost to move it! I can always 'drop' the prop' shaft and pop it into the FL.

Design and build isn't a problem - but knowing where to attach it to on the [to be] towed FL?

Would it something like the nudge bar fitting to front crossmember...?
 
Plenty of ready made a bars on Ebay. Attach to lower arms. Not sure how legal they are now as the towed vehicle needs to be braked. Used to be an exemption if the towed vehicle was broken down but think that has now gone.
 
Freelander's have drive to the front and rear wheels consistently and the vcu is there to help take away tranission wind up between the varying speeds of each wheel. Although you are right it also engages lock to the rear when the front slips.

I wouldn't want to be removing the propshaft at the side of the road. Granted not a hard/impossible job just not easy. Made hard by the fact it could be dark or raining or next to a fast flowing road

The A frame I used all you did was strap the front wheels down. It was a normal 2wd car though.
 
Are we on about the same type of A frame here. Has Two wheels. Winch/drive the car up onto it and the rear wheels just follow on the ground?
 
ady014 said:
Plenty of ready made a bars on Ebay. Attach to lower arms. Not sure how legal they are now as the towed vehicle needs to be braked. Used to be an exemption if the towed vehicle was broken down but think that has now gone.
Click to expand...

My good mate, a local copper of 40 years, is very big into motor homes and towing.

He tells me that the towing of vehicles is a very very grey area and knows of no one that has been prosecuted for towing a vehicle on an a-frame.
 
i would look into it if i was you as insurance may be involved
would it not be better to hire a trailer or transporter lots of them around for self drive hire
Ron
 
Trailer = hire and fuel. I'd be towing the weight of the trailer [a tandem wheel job that fits quite large cars] and the FL1 @1450kg so the towed weight could be getting up to 2500kgs or more.

Car transporter companies are expensive, I did ask for a price and it was the same as the cost of the vehicle itself. It all just make this 'project' car a bit out of reach.

Self drive truck ... now that's an idea I'll look into.

HTR
 
The classic A frame is designed to remove a broken down vehicle out of the way of other traffic. It's an effective way to move a vehicle too. I've used them many times when I was on call at a garage I worked at.
In law the vehicle attached to the A frame becomes an un-braked trailer. Iirc EU law states that all un-braked trailers must have a maximum GW of under 750 Kg's. A Freelander weighs twice that unladen.
So in effect it's illegal to use an A frame for a Freelander, or pretty much any car available today.
Unless you are recovering one that has broken down.
 
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With regard to a "home made" A Frame...

Since all towbars and towing equipment now have to be EU type approved for use on a public road anywhere in Europe, including the UK, would that not also apply to the A Frame since thats towing equipment? All it would take is for a savvy copper to pull you to inspect, and you could well be shafted, speshly if its a long distance...not something I'd be doing with a "that'll do" frame
 
I did a lot of research into this last year when I was considering moving a broken down 3.5 ton horse box from Cheshire to Yorkshire late one night with my Discovery. The law isn't clear but it is enforceable. Some of les garcons bleu don't know the law, some know it inside out and backwards... This is my interpretation - which may be wrong - but it was enough to put me off the idea.

- "A-frames" and "Dolly's" are classed as trailers and therefore trailer laws apply. That means a full lighting board, number plate of the towing vehicle and if the gross kerb weight of the vehicle + towing device exceeds 750Kg then every wheel of the "trailer" that is in contact with the road must be braked. That means all four wheels of the car if you are using an a-frame OR the dolly wheels plus the two rear wheels of the car if a dolly is being used. NOTE - gross weight means what is stamped on the car and not what it actually is - so if you have a Smart Car when the engine, gearbox and interior removed which weighs 550 Kg but is stamped at 751 Kg - needs to be braked. The exception to this is where the towing vehicle is registered as a breakdown/recovery vehicle.- Hence AA and RAC vans CAN use them (and pay less tax...) "Braked" means operated by an overrun coupling.

- Rigid tow poles are not classed as trailers and are a legal means of moving vehicles, but the vehicle being towed must be road legal (road worthy, tax, MOT, insurance) and the maximum towing weight of the towing vehicle must not be exceeded.

- All of the above goes out of the window if you are towing (rope, pole, dolly, a-frame) a broken down vehicle from the highway to a place of safety (i.e. next services on the motorway) but you could be prosecuted for other offences if doing so creates a danger (i.e. towing a Disco with a Metro?).

You often see Smart cars, mini's etc. on A-frames and dollies at the back of motorhomes - they are not legal.

That said I was on the M62 in East Yorkshire recently and I saw a Police T5 waft pass a M reg Vauxhall Cavalier that was towing a trailer with a Renault Leguna estate on it at around 70 - way over weight and over speed but didn't do anything about it. Bear in mind they can force you to abandon the trailer/car and arrange recovery.

If anyone has a different interpretation of the law I would genuinely like to hear it.

Richard
 
Last edited:
Tannaton said:
I did a lot of research into this last year when I was considering moving a broken down 3.5 ton horse box from Cheshire to Yorkshire late one night with my Discovery. The law isn't clear but it is enforceable. Some of les garcons bleu don't know the law, some know it inside out and backwards... This is my interpretation - which may be wrong - but it was enough to put me off the idea.

- "A-frames" and "Dolly's" are classed as trailers and therefore trailer laws apply. That means a full lighting board, number plate of the towing vehicle and if the gross kerb weight of the vehicle + towing device exceeds 750Kg then every wheel of the "trailer" that is in contact with the road must be braked. That means all four wheels of the car if you are using an a-frame OR the dolly wheels plus the two rear wheels of the car if a dolly is being used. NOTE - gross weight means what is stamped on the car and not what it actually is - so if you have a Smart Car when the engine, gearbox and interior removed which weighs 550 Kg but is stamped at 751 Kg - needs to be braked. The exception to this is where the towing vehicle is registered as a breakdown/recovery vehicle.- Hence AA and RAC vans CAN use them (and pay less tax...) "Braked" means operated by an overrun coupling.

- Rigid tow poles are not classed as trailers and are a legal means of moving vehicles, but the vehicle being towed must be road legal (road worthy, tax, MOT, insurance) and the maximum towing weight of the towing vehicle must not be exceeded.

- All of the above goes out of the window if you are towing (rope, pole, dolly, a-frame) a broken down vehicle from the highway to a place of safety (i.e. next services on the motorway) but you could be prosecuted for other offences if doing so creates a danger (i.e. towing a Disco with a Metro?).

You often see Smart cars, mini's etc. on A-frames and dollies at the back of motorhomes - they are not legal.

That said I was on the M62 in East Yorkshire recently and I saw a Police T5 waft pass a M reg Vauxhall Cavalier that was towing a trailer with a Renault Leguna estate on it at around 70 - way over weight and over speed but didn't do anything about it. Bear in mind they can force you to abandon the trailer/car and arrange recovery.

If anyone has a different interpretation of the law I would genuinely like to hear it.

Richard
Click to expand...

This ^^^^
 
I'm sure the law must be different here in NZ because there's loads of motor homes (ex small buses) on the roads towing (mainly) Vitaras.

HTR, If you want fly up, we can use my Freelander to tow it back here (using the trailer I rented to bring my SIII home) - you can swap the head over then drive it back down? I don't have a lot of tools - but you're welcome to use what ever I've got. If you time it right, I could follow you 1/2 way back and take in some fishing at the canals :)
 
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