Towing a Caravan

Was gutted today! After passing her MOT and doing exstensive testing with my 1974 88 2.25 petrol Land Rover, I hitched her up to my medium sized Caravan only to find her gutless on even the slightest of gradiants.
She goes like a bomb without towing and never uses a drop of oil or water so whats stopping her??? No brakes binding, on the flat or down hill shes away!
Just bit puzzled...............

Perhaps your expectations are too high, think agricultural speed maybe?

Rattlegun said:

Perhaps your expectations are too high, think agricultural speed maybe?

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What Rattlegun said, It's a vintage vehicle.It might be quick on it's own, but you have just added a tonne of weight to the back.

absolutely std for a series

its the difference between kinetic & potential energy.

it runs slower when weight is added to it!


strange :scratching_chin:

Given that my 2.25 diesel is only around 60 horse power and a reasonable cruise is 45 mph.
I think any form of towing would blunt the performance. Maybe you need a 200 TDI under the bonnet.

Talk to Roland at ace his hi torque cam and hi compression head make a worthwhile difference especially with some weight

even behind my 200tdi 109 i knew i had the caravan there, it was like towing a 600kilo parachute at 55mph although hills and the like barely made any difference, my problem was mostly wind drag/turbulence

How much does your caravan weigh? I'm thinking of towing 750kg with my 2.25 petrol and not sure how many passengers to put in it too.

CalumM said:

How much does your caravan weigh? I'm thinking of towing 750kg with my 2.25 petrol and not sure how many passengers to put in it too.

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in ya caravan or in the series??? number of paasengers won't affect towing. empty or full. It'll still be ****e...

CalumM said:

How much does your caravan weigh? I'm thinking of towing 750kg with my 2.25 petrol and not sure how many passengers to put in it too.

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I gave up the idea of towing a 8/900 kg boat in my 2.25 petrol as the hill up to where the boat is kept was too much other than in low range and going back down it with the boat was dodgy, brakes-wise. They are a bit dangerous towing in modern traffic to my mind, unless its below 500kg roughly. In comparison, an old 1.6 Suzuki Vitara injection towed much better (sorry guys) than my series!:censored:

I have towed all sorts for miles with a series one, at one time i had a seven ton boat on a two ton trailer, I towed it through Torquay town, and backed it down the slipway into the harbor, no probs, changed to a series two diesel and it wouldn't pull granny off her **** pot.
The figures don't bear this out but to drive, the series 1 , was far superior to the series two. I never tried the series two fitted with the IOE engine. They did make a few in 1958. Any body on here drive one of them?