Why you should tow smarter

COMMENT

Eighteen months ago I made some new ‘friends’ when I wrote an article titled ‘Why you should tow faster’. It’s a reasonable understatement to say  that not everyone agreed!

Now the Queensland Government has a road safety campaign running titled ‘Drive smarter, not faster’ and perhaps surprisingly I’m on the same page when it comes to towing a caravan.

‘Smarter’ if you’re towing a caravan means staying out of trouble by being aware of what you’re in control of, local road rules, vehicles around you and their drivers’ capabilities. That doesn’t necessarily mean going slower, just going smarter and that’s often faster anyway.

Here are some simple ways I've learnt over the years to stay out of trouble…

Know your rig

It sounds obvious, but you really need to understand how the caravan behind you is going to affect the way you interact with the road and other road users.

For a start, everything is going to take longer: steering response, braking distance, acceleration and the time to overtake a slower-moving vehicle.

It sounds obvious, but that’s how many caravanners get themselves into trouble. You decide to make a pass; it takes longer than you think; the crest of a hill, double lines and oncoming vehicles loom; the other side of the road is off-camber and you’re vulnerable to side winds that can gust between trees.

Often the end result is you over-react to get out of trouble, and the de-stabilising effects of wind and road angle multiply if your caravan is badly loaded and your tow ball, pillar or pin weight is too low, or too high.

An essential starting point is to have your rig set-up properly before you leave.

I recently wrote about the benefits of on-site caravan weighing, but you need your tow car and van already loaded and ready to go to get a true result. I can’t recommend this highly enough, as apart from protecting you from your insurance company and the authorities if something goes wrong, you can be fairly confident that your rig will behave in a predictable manner in an emergency.

It’s also important on tandem axle caravans to have the van approximately level when loaded and travelling, otherwise if it’s nose down, its rear tyres will have less contact with the road and the van will pivot less stably around its front tyres.

Keep up – or keep back

You need to decide on a sensible cruising speed on the open road and then try to maintain it.

If you travel at the posted speed limit, you’ll be able to maintain a sensible distance to vehicles ahead, and there will be less chance of trucks or other road users cutting in ahead of you and using up your emergency braking distance.

I’m not saying that travelling at the speed limit is a good idea on all roads, but most of the truck drivers will be doing it by necessity.

Of course, this is difficult unless you have a powerful tow vehicle with a lot of torque (pulling power) that will allow you to maintain your flat road cruising speed up moderate hills.

If you haven’t, or are hauling a heavy van, you might need to re-evaluate your towing speed. Too close to the speed limit and you’re inviting impatient following traffic, including truck drivers on a tight schedule, to take risks to pass you.

An alternative is to tow slower – say 80-85km/h instead of 95-100km/h – and be alert to the fact that almost everyone behind will want to pass, so give them space when it’s safe to do so, politely flicking on your left-hand blinker to let them know your intentions.

Be patient

This problem is magnified in traffic and on local freeways, where everyone else’s time is obviously more valuable than yours.  The problem here is that if you give them the room you need to stop if the traffic jams ahead, some idiot with no idea of the danger, will duck in front of you to devour your safety margin.

You could get  angry, but with road rage so prevalent these days, it’s more satisfying and a lot safer to respond by being smarter.

After years of fruitless lane swapping, following the disproven ‘grass is greener’ theory, I’ve discovered that the left hand side of the freeway gets you there with less anxiety within a few minutes of the more stressful and risky zig-zag alternative.

Sure, you need to slow to allow feeder traffic in, but you also don’t need to navigate across three lanes when it comes to your exit.

Queensland Government research has shown that speeding saves drivers just 77 seconds on an average urban commute.

Console yourself by thinking how much longer you will live stress-free than the idiot who just risked everything to arrive 77 seconds earlier.

Stay alert

Towing requires a lot more concentration than driving without two or more tonnes on your tow bar. Length is one thing that requires you to add up to nine metres to your travelling length when overtaking and you need to be much more alert to what’s going on several vehicles ahead and to road and weather conditions.

The problem is that the consequences of getting it wrong are much greater. A caravan rig is no match for modern cars and their many driver aids, like ABS brakes, Lane Departure Warning, Active Cruise Control and Autonomous Braking. Caravan sway controls like AL-KO’s ESC and Dexter’s DSC certainly help, but your sharpest tool in the box is your brain and how alert it is.

Long travelling hours, sun-glare, a late night, a large lunch and dehydration all take their toll and a microsleep when towing can have disastrous consequences.

Fresh air, a little exercise and caffeine drinks or tablets all help, but research has shown that it takes 20-30 minutes for caffeine to be absorbed into your bloodstream and take effect. So, counter-intuitively, it’s best to have a 20-minute power nap immediately after a caffeine hit before driving off.

I find that an engaging podcast works better to keep my brain alert than loud driving music, so I subscribe to a series of them that I can access when I travel. Audio books also work well if you’re interested in the topic and the plot is pacey.

I also love trip computers and use them to play games with myself when travelling. My aim is to travel at the highest possible average speed while achieving the lowest average fuel consumption. I usually set myself an optimistic target and spend all trip chasing it.

If all else fails, travel less

Many older caravanners have already discovered that packing less into each day can be a smart idea, either by choice (you’ve learned to ‘smell the roses’),  or necessity (your travelling budget only runs to a tank-full of fuel every second day, or  you can’t afford any more time off work).

I used to be one of those people who set off for a  destination and then counted down the hours until we arrived, begrudging time wasted on refuelling, lunch and even worthy local attractions that flew past our windows.

So we drank ‘Keep Cup’ coffee on the fly and ate either pre-prepared rolls or take away food as we travelled. Apart from the crumbs and beetroot stains, some food like salad sandwiches and hot pies, was clearly never designed for single-handed operation.

Food for thought?