27 - Why Caravans Crash

4x4 Earth - The 4WD, Camping, Fishing and Outdoors podcast.

We talk to Mike Clayton from Clayton's Towing. Started 45 years ago on the Sunshine Coast, Clayton's now has 15 depots and 100 staff.

Have a listen to this podcast if you ever tow a caravan, there are a lot of factors that you need to consider when planning your trip, and those factors can change between the start of your trip and the end, so knowing how to drive with a caravan is really important. Please share with anyone who tows a caravan.

Mike drives a FJ Cruiser, goes offroad and tows a caravan - on top of that, he and his crews have seen a lot of caravan crashes, they are often one of the first people that drivers get to talk to after having a crash while towing a caravan so he is uniquely place to talk about some of the reasons why caravans crash.

Claytons Towing has seen a lot of unusual crashes, including a boat recovery off the beach, the sinkhole and aircraft crashes. We talk about how they worked to move winch a boat of the beach and the technical difficulties they faced with that.

Caravan crashes create a lot of mayhem on the roads and tend to get more publicity,

We discuss towball weight,the weight of vehicles, electric breaking, caravan wobbles.

Towball weight can either be too light or too heavy and the weight on the towball can change during a trip, so a good understanding of what towball weight is and how it effects the towing performance is really important.

Vehicle weight - just because a car or ute is rated to 2.5 ton, doesn't mean that you should. Some vehicles, especially utes can be quite light when towing a large caravan.

Electric brakes need to be adjusted for different driving. Highway driving needs more brakes than city driving.

A lot of people think that when the caravan starts to wobble you should speed up, but Mike has seen many people who have speed up and it has only made things worse. You might be better off using the caravan brakes to straighten out the caravan and pull it straight, rather than speeding up.

Be cautious on windy roads, especially when going downhill.

Mike isn't an engineer, but his wisdom is based on years of experience in dealing with caravan crashes.

Please share this podcast with anyone who tows a caravan so that we can help more people get to their holiday and return safe and sound.

Keep an eye out on 7 Mate for their new TV Show - Towie's featuring the crew from Clayton's and some of the interesting people and jobs that they do.