tow options- dolly, open, vehicles?

[Dennis Hale <dhale_510@yahoo.com>]

I think the subject originally asked of has been
missed here. Whether a Blues mobile Caprice or
Subdivision/Excursion/Aztek is a tow truck or not was
not the subject.

I have towed a bit. You gotta if you wanna play with a
fast car around here....Maybe 250,000 miles over the
years. I have tried a bunch of things that were not
really good. In summary, tow dollies are bad news.
Trailers are much better.

Tow dolly problems include;
1 You cannot back them up.
2 They do not tie the car down reliably, you must
reset the tie downs about every 50 to 100 miles. You
cannot actually tie them down tightly or they will
twist and break things.
3 They have no braking action.
4 They cost as much as open trailers.
5 The towed car still has rear wheel/suspension/tire
wear.
6 A race car with suspension or wheel problems cannot
be towed on a dolly.
7 The towed car is just a large floppy bumper in
traffic.
8 The towed car must be leaglly registered and insured
for road use.

Trailers are better largely due to the added braking
capacity they offer. It is all too easy to overload
the tow vehicle brakes, especially if you are trying
to use a silly SUV or less than 3/4 ton rated truck or
van. A lack of brakes is a bad thing.
You also want to tow with whatever has the most
reserve payload for that towing as you can tolerate.
Converted police cruisers and 4wd anythings are in
conflict with this spartan concept. At issue are wheel
and tire overloading, rear axle durability, braking
system wear rate, and keeping the tow truck ahead of
the trailer. Getting the trailer out front or even
along side is always very bad.

Reasonable minds may differ 

=====
Dennis Hale
Yahoo! Tax Center - online filing with TurboTax
http://taxes.yahoo.com/