Towing Issues: Towing Ford Ranger with a dolly, tow dolly, rv towing

Question
QUESTION: Do you have any information on towing a Ford Ranger with an automatic transmission on a dolly?

ANSWER: Well any time you tow a vehicle with its drive wheels on the ground, you will risk damaging the transmission..

Some manufacturers have limits on how far they can be towed, some are 15 miles at 30 mph or so before damage happens.

Best method is to either use the dolly with the drive wheels on the dolly (yes this is loading the vehicle backwards).. You do need to secure (tie) the steering wheel so its in a straight position to allow it to follow your tow vehicle.

Next best is to load it frontwards and then remove (disconnect) the driveline at the rear axle.  This is done by removing the bolts (4 of them) and then tying it up unless you want to remove the whole thing from the transmission slip collar (be advised that in some cases this will cause the transmission fluid to drain from the transmission  BIG MESS)



---------- FOLLOW-UP ----------

QUESTION: HOW ABOUT TOWING A MANUAL TRANSMISSION FORD RANGER ON A TOW DOLLY BEHIND A MOTORHOME?

Answer
OK, While RV towing issues is not my area of expertise, this is from a site I use for some information to answer questions...
If you want to go look at things then check out

http://www.towspec.com

VEHICLE TOW DIAGRAM
Apx. Weight
3300  


 MPH/Miles MPH/Miles
Automatic 35/50 Unl/Unl
Manual    35/Unl Unl/Unl

Keep in mind this if information which we use for towing broke down vehicles or wrecked vehicles... NOT BEHIND MOTOR HOMES...  Also a lot of answers are also depending on other issues, such as age of vehicle, mileage of vehicle, how often it was serviced, is the fluid levels full or not.. All kinds of things factor into answers here...

When using a tow dolly, your best bet is to load the drive wheels onto the dolly.  That means on a Rear Wheel drive vehicle, load it backwards.  On 4 wheel drives with locking hubs then you can load it backwards and make sure the hubs are in free position... Or if you can place the transfer case into 2 High which applies power only to the rear wheels..

If you want to learn more about RV towing of vehicles (called Dingy towing) check out

http://www.motorhomemagazine.com

for information and articles about it..


IF YOU ARE LOOKING FOR AN ANSWER which is a yes or no answer or one that you can pin blame on my VOLUNTEER PROVIDED INFORMATION here, you are not going to get it...

Check with an RV dealer in your area or a Camping World store for specific information which you might have..