Towing a Teardrop Caravan

Quite a few people ask us what it’s like to tow one of our Teardrop caravans. We have customers who have not towed before and others coming with lots of experience. This article will cover a number of aspects of towing and what to consider, specifically for our Hero and Procamp Teardrop Caravans.

What vehicle will tow the caravans?

The great thing with our Teardrop caravans is that they are lightweight and towable by a large range of vehicles. The first step is to check out what your car is capable of towing in terms of weight and then what the maximum towball weight can be. Once you know this you can check out our specifications for each model which show the weight of the caravan and the tow ball weight. The curb weights given in the specifications are for the caravan at it’s standard specification, as you add accessories the weight will increase. You will also need to consider how much equipment you are going to carry as that will also increase the weight. You will see the specifications also have the maximum weight which is the combined weight of the caravan, accessories and any equipment you are carrying.

Let’s take an example of the Bushcamp Scout which has a curb weight of 500KG and then as you add accessories this will increase in weight. The maximum weight that the caravan can be is 1300KG. So once you add your accessories the Bushcamp Scout weight could be around 650KG. This would then give you 650KG worth of load capacity for gear. The weight on the tow ball is 30KG with a maximum of 75KG.

All our Teardrop Caravans have their own brakes even if they do not require brakes (trailers under 750KG do not require brakes).

For full details check out the UK government guide.

Do i need a special licence?

Not anymore…The rules have now changed for Towing a trailer. For all licences you can now tow up to 3500KG.

For more information check out the UK government guide.

What are they like to tow?

Here we will give you our own view of what the Teardrop caravans are like to tow from our own experience. The great thing about our caravans is they are lightweight so put less strain on your vehicle, which is much more noticeable on country roads and steeper hills. As they are lightweight your driving experience while towing is pretty straightforward.

All our caravans have lights on the wheel arches which are great as they provide a guide to the width of the caravan and very visible in your wing mirrors. Depending on your vehicle you will not need any special mirrors although If you have quite a narrow car you may find these useful.

Driving on smaller roads is a much better experience than a larger caravan as you take up less of the road for tight corners and have the ability to pull off the road easily if needed to let people past. We recently undertook the Scottish 500 which was a lot of single track road driving and we never had an issue and didn’t see any larger caravans on the roads we went on.

What are they like to manoeuvre?

If your on a reasonable surface then the Teardrop caravans can be pushed by hand which comes in very useful. When hitching up a gentle nudge will get you hitched up so you don’t need to get perfectly lined up with the vehicle. When moving around your property to get into it’s storage spot you can do this by hand keeping things simple. This came in really useful when we were on the Scottish 500 and reaching a dead end with nowhere to turn, we simply unhitched and spun the Teardrop caravan around by hand and hitched on again without any panic!

Ask us if your unsure..

If you are not sure about towing or have any questions then please let us know and we will do the best we can to help.