Which Ute To Buy

[Duncan]

jesus thats as bad as the stagea - 3 tanks of fuel to melbourne

[bloodzkull]

i have a new petrol navara, great tow car power and speed wise good for 150 kph odd with trailer behind! lol

but absolutely sh!t house for fuel consumption!

why'd you buy a petrol one? i assume your talking about the d40 models?

my old man had a diesal d40. 2.5ltr 4 cylinder diesal. GREAT car seeing over 650 from a tank when driving in the city. fuel consumption can go down below the 9 ltr per 100km average on highway driving. consumption barely changed an with my old sil80 and a trailer you almost would notice it was there.

the old saying goes if your gonna tow go diesel

[ali-turko]

i would go the new modle navara, its a very nice, and my boss toes an easy 3tonnes with it, half the time you forget your pulling 3 tonnes of scaffolding

[Trust33]

man, some good replys. thats given me some good ideas. i hear u gary re: the 4wd is needed in muddy situations. im still looking arround though. the ordfay sounds like the best option so far.

it seems as though the 2.6 petrol mazda bravo wont cut the mustard without some extra heavy duty work done to the rear end. not to mention load bareing tyres. found out it was easy enough to go out and buy a 2.5 tonne tow bar and assembly 2nd hand easily enough for the bravo though.

i was being told by a hard to understand serbian fellow at work today that the lpg systems on cars need to have checkups regularly. he says that once a year isnt good enough and that most people dont even do it that often. he's an ex taxi driver. he said that their cars were inspected on a 3 month basis. i dont know how true that story is re: road cars.

how often do AU fords need a rebuild? id expect them to go to 500,000klm no probs with regular oil changes and being treated right. all of the ones in my price range are at the 200,000klm mark.

[SECURITY]

Part 1 http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Lrk6vsb77xk...feature=related

Part 2 a

Part 2 b

watch them.. they'll completely convert you to a hilux man.

[N1GTR]

Ford F150

[FATAZZ]

crap pic,but this is my neighbours truck.

im sure you get the idea.

Edited March 12, 2008 by FATAZZ

[SECURITY]

Ford F150

thats a big truck. compensating for something steve?

[Beer Baron]

yeah dunc go diesel ! we dont see anymore than 300/350 kay when towing on 80 litre tank!

spencer and I use his navara STR turbo diesel. it is awesome to tow with. it's a 4 door with 5 usable seats, has a hard top for the tray (down side is limits storage badly, upside is it locks) and has towed the GT3 cup car, my GTR, his group NC Alfa and dozens and dozens of others over the last couple of years. it even fit my big ass sony LCD tv in the back (just!). also being turbo diesel we cranked up the boost a bit and got a chip for it too. goes pretty well now but fuel consumption is not exactly stellar. but it can tow at a pretty rapid pace easy well past 110. chirps seconds too.

[Duncan]

lol even the stag chirps second now its manual and hte boost is turned up

[giant]

got the petrol , because it goes like a rocket and i can deal with the fuel economy.

also i didnt like the noisy diesel and didnt want a manual (the auto diesel was twice as noisy, always reving on the convertor)

[Trust33]

Part 1 http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Lrk6vsb77xk...feature=related

Part 2 a

Part 2 b

watch them.. they'll completely convert you to a hilux man.

omg thats insane.

[Mean_R34]

How about an old Turbo Diesel Landcruiser?

They would tow a house and you wouldn't notice til you looked in the mirror.

Would be kinda thirsty around town, but prob use less juice towing than an AU as they aren't working as hard.

[FineLine]

I've towed most of my working life and tried them all, Utes are ok but there is the afore mentioned security and lack of passenger room. Landcruisers are good too, Just not as bombproof as toyota would have you believe.

The best tow vehicle I have used and still use is the Nissan patrol.

I have owned the 3 litre variant, the 2.8 litre td jobbie, the 4.2 petrol and my current worker is the 4.8 petrol.

They all performed a stellar job, even the smaller engined units worked well above their weight and both ran up many hundreds of thousands of kays before i moved them on.

The 4.8 laughs at any load I care to pull with it. It likes a drink but that has been minimised with some custom pipework. an ecu and a dyno. Its big, comfy. power to burn and refuses to fail. (it will also tow a loaded car trailer faster than that too Russ )

The other advantage to using 4b's is the weight over the front axle. rwd utes etc are ok but still subject to rock steer even on a well set up balanced trailer package. You start hitting some undulating road and the weight transfer to and from the front of the tow vehicle is far more pronounced in the rwd. The heavier fronted 4wd virtually eliminate this phenomina.

The only other option that I can see is the even bigger ford/chev pickup truck style vehicles but cost becomes a real limiting factor there.

[boxheadmr]

I have the 2200kg tow kit put onto my VZ V6 commadore sedan and it tows great, probally does abot 15ltrs/100klms with the car on and can sit on 110klm/h very easily.

Even going up Mooney Mooney it sits on 100klm although reving the guts out of it.

Big boot for the tool box and jack bt and pieces and luggage, rear seat for the passengers and usally put spare wheels in the car that is being towed.

I used to have a VS commadore V6 which also did a stellar job but recomend getting the tow kit with the bags which i have in the VZ as you can lift the rear of the car up so it is not dragging it's arse on the ground.

You could pick up a second hand commadore for fairly cheap so maybe this is an option (could go a station wagon if you want).

Matt

[cuppas]

if you get a navara, dont get one of the newer shape. theyre faarked

if anything, get a D22, nissan brought them back because the new was no good

new D22 runs the patrol 3L diesel

or something like a patrol, you can get them in 4.2L turbo diesel (ST-6 i think?)

[bloodzkull]

what wrong with the d40 model (new shape) i know of at least 3 (one being my parent's that i drive regulary) that haven't had any real issues at all? all are used for towing and four wheel driving and just general town driving?

thier only downfall is they are pretty big and lack of ground clearance. but you don't buy a new 4wd to go do harcore four wheel driving do you

[cuppas]

we saw lots of them in for fixes at work

one died after like 210km

but that was exceptional

only RO we ever got with a D22?

tray lid needed replacing.

[edited]

Edited April 9, 2008 by cuppas

[Duncan]

don't say that mate I need one of those d40 turbo diesels. the non turbo 22 was gutless

[cuppas]

90s TD patrol ST-6 is made of win.

Edited April 10, 2008 by cuppas