Having Towbars Fitted & Trailer Driving Lessons?

sjp1

sjp1

Well-Known Member
Sep 14, 2009
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OH very kindly bought me a trailer which my friend tows.

I have a 4x4 but have never bothered to have a towbar fitted!!!

I have driven the sheep trailer full of sheep behind the Landrover, albeit slowly, several times, but somehow I have a mental block when it comes to towing Tobes!!!

So, OH who is a busy farmer I would very much doubt has time to teach me to reverse etc. in a trailer, and would probably lead to rows ..........., so although I passed my test so long ago I actually don't need a trailer test, I thought I should have some proper lessons. ETA, I am hopeless at reversing trailers!!!

I also want to join a riding club and do stuff this year, (friend quite busy with new partner) so in spite of OH being against me having a towbar fitted as he says towing will knacker the clutch on my vehicle, I think this is what I want to do. I will never get to have the Landrover when I need it, and I will need a towbar to do trailer lessons.

How much am I looking at for both do you think?
 
I looked at having a towbar fitted to my Subaru Forrester as OH's discovery I could never get my hands on when I wanted to tow. I got a price of £275 for a towbar fitted. I'm confident (ish) with a trailer though.

I didn't get it fitted though as we ended up buying another Discovery ! :eek:

Lessons I don't know the price off however I did have access to various large (and empty !) car parks so to refresh myself I plonked mini Ruskii in her car seat and hitched the empty trailer up and went cruising ! Empty trailer meant I had no worries about a horse and I built my confidence in parking, turning and re hitching the trailer. It was all in my own time and I sussed it myself for reference. I took a pic of it correctly hitched so if I thought I wasn't right I just looked on my phone. But our trailer is 20 years old so has different cables and a breakaway cable. Modern trailers are a lot more straight forward I think.

Have fun ! :D
 
Last tow bar I had fitted was about £250. Got an instructor to come to our place, use our vehicle and trailer for half a day to prepare daughter for towing test, (mainly in the reversing/manouveres as she had been driving under supervision for a season) I think he charged about £60 but these days probably closer to £80.

I do think it is important to have a couple of lessons even if you don't need to do a test. I can see how much better my daughter is than me when driving a lorry or towing just by having the knowledge rather than muddling through!!!
 
I agree about £250 for a tow bar to be fitted. I looked at trailer lessons (an unfortunate turn of events means I now need to do a test) and they actually weren't horrific if using your own vehicle, ask around the younguns on your yard, someone is bound to know of a trailer instructor, but don't underestimate just playing around with it unloaded somewhere safe, you might only need one lesson to polish things that way.
 
I think the mod team should vet new members posts for at least the first few - we had another commercial spammer on here selling KET the other day.

Either disallow the posts or move them somewhere like a "Commercial" bin.
 
cwb said:
I think the mod team should vet new members posts for at least the first few - we had another commercial spammer on here selling KET the other day.

Either disallow the posts or move them somewhere like a "Commercial" bin.
Click to expand...

I think that, to some extent new posters are vetted, if someone posts spam then it is reported and deleted. You are still going to get spam though. Personally, when it comes to spam, I think the users should be banned right away. There isn't much else that can be done about it except from deleting the spam and banning the member.
 
Most BBS software allows the first so many posts of new members to be approved by admin BEFORE they get posted.

It is a growing trend that commercial companies join BBS and facebook sites to post adverts - possibly through an agent. As soon as you let these people in. albeit briefly, then you get bombarded with registrations.
 
cwb said:
Most BBS software allows the first so many posts of new members to be approved by admin BEFORE they get posted.

It is a growing trend that commercial companies join BBS and facebook sites to post adverts - possibly through an agent. As soon as you let these people in. albeit briefly, then you get bombarded with registrations.
Click to expand...

Ah that is a good point. It might put some people off but might be better for the board in the long run. It is getting annoying seeing spam every couple of days.
 
It needn't put people off as long as the mod team have the capacity to do the job - I have my sites on messaging so I know when users register and usually approve or ban them within minutes.
 
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