Club 80-90 Forums

I have a 1.9 DG Auto at present with a high top which is great for pootling about however. I also own a caravan which I like to use for longer holidays which I tow with a c4 picasso 1.6HDI. In these days of economising I would like to manage with the van and a scooter instead of the car. I have tried towing my trailer (400KG) with the van and have discovered that the waterboxer was not concieved in order to tow!!! I have looked into converting the van to Scooby power keeping my Auto gearbox (Which is already externally cooled). I was thinking an EJ22 with 130 BHP would match well.
1. Has anyone any experience of towing with a Scooby equipped T25
2. Has anyone any experience of towing with the Auto box?
MY caravan is a Bailey with a max weight of 1015 KG and ex works of 785 KG.

Well, considering that VW thought that the DF would be sufficient as the most powerful flat four that they had yet designed, only to up the ante to the DG, meanwhile Oetti designed the first 2.1 (that VW subsequently adopted)
Sounds like your DG is clapped out and not raising anything like its rated 78 metric ponies...

EJ22 is a strong, punchy, efficient engine. Damn them.

Towing with an auto is a load easier than with a manual box, thanks to torque multiplication.

not sure how auto box affects performance but we have towed a 1020kg caravan max weight 1300kg with our old DG also towed buggy on A frame to Le Mans and back a couple of times ( 745KG). Now upgraded to super powerful 2.1MV on lpg

I used my DG van (manual) to trailer my kitcar from SE England to the Scottish Borders, over Carter Bar, without any difficulty. Combined weight would have been around a tonne. Couldn't exactly fly up hills though.

Thanks for the replies, I have recently rebuilt the engine in my van so it is not clapped out but does struggle with hills and even slight inclines with the trailer on. I dare not try the caravan!!! I have memories of towing a 14ft elddis weighing 1000kg with my first freight rover 200 series equipped with a perkins prima all 60 bhp of it. In a head wind once we couldn't manage more than 40 mph on the M5 going to Weston S Mare. (Very stressful). Once I had an LDV pilot hightop I stripped the XUD9 (70hp) out and put an XUD9TE (turbo) from a 306 into it (92bhp). This was a cracking towing vehicle. The waterboxer however is great on the flat and will do over 70 on the motorway even with the auto box but towing seems to kill it. The autobox seems to want to be in top most of the time and even if I select 2nd I don't gain alot like you would with a manual. Perhaps it is the gearbox and not the engine? I would quite like to rebuild a 2.1 to put in it but I can't find one. Everyone seems to have old DG's.

I've towed a Freedom Twin for around 1000 miles this summer. It's quite light. I don't remember the weights exactly - maybe 650kg ex works, 750/780kg ish max weight - but my 1.9DG managed very well. When you're on a flat road then it's the wind resistance that will affect top speed, but given that the camper has almost as much frontal area as the caravan I found that motorway speeds were virtually unaffected. MPG was also affected much less than I was expecting - maybe 2-3mpg worse overall.

But the extra weight certainly does affect acceleration, and performance on the hills. It just means you have to think ahead a bit more. With the manual box it's easy to change down and keep the engine revving at its sweet spot, even if that means taking the hills in a lower gear, and therefore a bit slower, than you'd like. I guess that could be a crucial difference with an auto box.

For what its worth, I don't think it would be much fun towing a heavier van with a 1.9. I think it would be a bit of a strain. Imagine driving an NA diesel.

No probs at all with mine 2.0ej 4 speed pulls a 2 berth with ease no hills at all on motorways and the ability to overtake mpg about 23/25 with van on going steady In fact just got back from a weekend away with the van excellent tow vehicle

Steve