'89 LWB twin wheel weight and length

[fastmower]

Hi all,

Some of this is in the "towing a heavy trailer" thread in non Transit talk.

Hopefully going to be getting the '89 LWB van in the barn - but recovery firm wanted 350 quid to get it back here, and I don't have that much in the new toys fund at the minute! Towing with an A frame appears to be out as although the firm selling them say you can tow untaxed/untested stuff with them - it looks like that's bollox!

Next option is fetching it myself with a trailer. There's a big Ifor Williams at work which I think will be big enough - but can anyone give me the overall length of the van - '89 LWB twin wheeler. I'm also trying to find out if the whole lot will be over 5500kg which is the max train weight for my County.

If anyone has any figures I'd be grateful!

Cheers all,

Andy

[GABRIEL]

Did you try getting a tape measure AND MEASURING IT????

[fastmower]

Did you try getting a tape measure AND MEASURING IT????

Errrr........no.......never thought of that The barn with the van is about two and a half hours away from here mate - that's why I haven't measured it
Andy

[madmark]

well when i need to pick something up like that i use a A frame ,then run a light bord to the back of the van! your county will pull it fine if you take it easy!
the problem i have found in the past is the track of the front wheels for putting on trailers they are normaly just slightly to wide! so it would have to be a bigun!
also i was allways led to belive that if you were towing a vehicle then the tax and test wasnt needed as you could be takeing it to get it ready for a test but maybe the stupid rules have changed!

[djswampy]

its about 16-18' long. The bed on my trailer is 16' but it overhung the front and back a touch. its also about 6'6" wide. Weight, we calculated it to be 1.8tonnes but it sat on the weighbridge at a scrappy with only light amounts of scrap inside at 2.2tonnes. must of been tat heavy oil inside
The van is a '99 mk5 smiley Transit LWB SHR 150 single rear wheel not twin. The mk3 (which I think your one you're collecting is) will have a shorter wheel base than the mk4/5 as the rear has more overhang on the mk3.
I'd of thought you could measure your county transit because they were LWB as well I thought.
I think you might be slightly over the max train weight of your van because Transits are only allowed to tow 2tonnes (I believe) and that's without the weight of the Ifor taken into account on top of the vans weight.
However a mk3 might be lighter. That said, does it run?

[fastmower]

Transits are only allowed to tow 2tonnes (I believe) and that's without the weight of the Ifor taken into account on top of the vans weight.

Hmmm - not sure where that info came from mate. According to the plate in the footwell, the GTM on the County is 5500kg, and the unladen weight is 2140kg. The Ifor Williams trailer is 805kg unladen, so I reckon we'll be coming in at just shy of 5 tons all up.

Andy

[djswampy]

it came from my interpretation of the plates. on mine its 5.3tonnes gross train. 3.3tonnes gross vehicle. 5.3 - 3.3 = 2 tonnes trailer weight.

[Luke]

mines 2 tonnes but 190 lwb's are more

[djswampy]

With regards to the trailer...

With the full B+E it doesnt matter what the gross weights of the vehicle are, so long as the max gross of the vehicle isnt exceeded on the own, the gross of the trailer isnt exceeded on its own, and the combined actual weights dont exceed the max train weight...

Ie. you can tow your 5 tonne MAM trailer with a B+E, but on the back of a transit its total weight has to be 2 tonnes or less

I was purely going on my 150.

[fastmower]

but on the back of a transit its total weight has to be 2 tonnes or less

I can see where you're coming from, but presumably if they took you off to a weighbridge and the outfit weighed less than 5500kg (in the case of my County), you'd be okay - even if the trailer and it's load came to more than 2 tons - and assuming of course that the trailer wasn't actually overloaded? I can't see them saying that your unladen Transit counted for 3.5 tons whatever it actually weighed - even though that's it's max gross - they'd surely have to go on what your outfit ACTUALLY weighed. Otherwise they could pull you for towing an empty 3.5 ton gross trailer with your empty 3.5 ton gross Transit as they'd count it as 7 tons!

Andy

[djswampy]

oh yeah, but it was if they wanted to get picky. If when you got pulled for a routine check and you tried to be a smart git or argumentative. Otherwise then yes, they'd stick you on the weighbridge and you could use some of the 150 or 190 as your towing allowance which would make a lot of sense really.

[vannut]

it came from my interpretation of the plates. on mine its 5.3tonnes gross train. 3.3tonnes gross vehicle. 5.3 - 3.3 = 2 tonnes trailer weight.

The gross plated weight of the van doesn't need to be considered in the train weight, unless it's full, i.e. if your van weighs 2 tonnes then you can pull 3.3 tonnes behind you, if you've got half a ton of gear in the back of the van and it weighs 2,5 tonnes, then you can only have 2.8 tonnes behind you, etc.