hi everyone ive been looking round for a tow bar for my bay and ive found some but there getting pricey i think i could make my own with good metal box section cheaper . and as my rear rails have been re done and are abit thicker on the metal i could custom make my own tow abr to the rear end . has anyone done this ,is it allowed ? its only a thought as even the onces people are selling mite be vw once but they have been around for a while there is no saying there that strong ? my plan would be to make it up on the van and tack it were i need then take it to a coded welded just to be on the safe side . any help ,advise would be great cheers
mine is a genuine VW bar and its basically a couple of pieces of box section and an angled flat plate as the bracket. So long as you can weld it shouldn't be an issue. Make sure you use good beefy bolts to bolt it up to the chassis. Welding the towbar to the chassis is not suitable as the welds would be unable to take the loads ;D
When I did the rear end on mine I welded on 6No 12mm nuts to re-attach the tow bar. Its made of pretty hefty stuff too.
personally i would make my own (i am a coded welder ) but i guess what you want to tow with it ,ie a small trailer or a car trailer +car ??
Well I would be getting it welded by a coded welder just to be safe , it's were it bolts to the van that's the main point as I want it on the inside of the chassis rails not on the bumper holes . Was thinking of bolting it via plates to the inside of the rails with 2 high strength bolts , It will be towing 450kg fully loaded ? Cheers guys most helpful
does your licence cover to tow , if you passed your test after aug i think 97 you have to do a test owen nw
^^^ what owen says is true, a lot of people don't realise that if you passed "recently" you shouldn't tow.Good reminder there mate.
http://www.direct.gov.uk/en/Motoring/DriverLicensing/CaravansTrailersCommercialVehicles/DG_4022564 the law
From what I have read even on a new type licence you can tow as long as your vehicle is not over 3.5 tonnes and what towing is not over 750 kg . I'm looking into it but from what I can see I'm ok to tow a trailer at450kg with my car or the bus
as i pointed out somewhere else, the law with mot tests and towbars has changed, mountings should be secure and the bolts are checked during the test, next year no matter if you use the towbar or not, if fitted the electrics must work. all towbars are now ce marked although i guess with these old busses certain "grandfather rights" would allow a bit of lieniency as you could make out it had been on for years, i would have to be 100% confident on fitting if i made my own as it wouldn't be a good day out if it came off.....2nd hand ones are cheap enough there are plenty for sale, why bother faffing and making one?
Im not a welder, not an engineer but i made mine out of angle iron, welded to a box section and bolted to the bumper irons!! I know some of you are gonna start going OOOOOhhhh no etc etc.. However mine took a shunt from Alanred7 , bended the trailor bent the whole tow bar box section but the tow bar itself (that I fabricated !! ) held strong!! I did reinforce with a spine but I was still shocked my fabrication and welding was that good!!! ;D ;D I was tought by my dad n brother who know there stuff but i never really thought it was that good!! Magical Trevs Magical bumpers!!! ;D ;D ;D Could it make me money???
there's a westy towbar for sale on this site, cheap as well, and the westy one uses it's own bumper mounts so it's hidden away, then like i did you can sell your bumper irons to offset the cost.
reading the info it seems to say you can can tow any combination as long as your total weight, car plus trailer does not exceed 3.5 ton
oh and CE or equivilent marks are not yet part of the MOT test, just the condition of the tow bar and its mountings
thanks for the clearing up on the ce marking stuff it's all brussels bull lol...anyway seems we all agree the mounting needs to be good and that's the main thing we seem to be agreed on.
