How much should a towbar cost?

i’ve never heard the need for a larger intercooler before. I get the engine will be under more load for longer, but its not like you will be flat out at high revs everwhere….. but everyday is a school day!

I’d go for the Westfalia. It’s essentially VW OEM and will plug and play nicely. Once coded properly it’ll be indistinguishable from OEM and you’ll get all the funky stuff like disabling the parking sensors when connected, TSC if you ever tow anything with wheels,  alarm integration (thread a 13 pin extension cord through the bikes and if anyone tries to disconnect them the alarm should go off). You may also notice the DSG box shift points change when the rack is connected.

Local skod dealer fitted a witter and connects2 electrical kit to my yeti. Blew the mind of the car needing a new wring loom and BCM. Skoda kindly wrote to me that they were invalidating my electrical warranty until it had been sorted by the dealer. Lovely. They’re no longer a dealer.

i think i paid £350ish for a detachable one on my Yeti 9 years ago. Waste of money. i cant remember the last time i detached it other than to make sure the lock wasnt jammed.

i’ve never heard the need for a larger intercooler before. I get the engine will be under more load for longer, but its not like you will be flat out at high revs everwhere….. but everyday is a school day!

I suspect he means a bigger oil cooler – I know some older automatics used to have a gearbox oil cooler added for towing.

What surprised me when I had a two bar fitted is that when the electrics are plugged in auto stop/start is disabled. Why?

I suppose it all depends what you’re fitting it to.

I’ve currently got a bit of a skip old car, and can find various kits between £100 – £400 for it on fleabay, depending whether they include a proper wiring harnesses and/or different Swan neck/straight/folding tow hooks…

The corresponding YouTube videos make it look simple enough for the basic fitting of the bar itself. It’s the electrics that worry me more than the bolts though, I don’t want to goose my brake lights through a lack of knowledge about CANBUS and magic string.

TBH I’d do it if I wasn’t planning to get shot of the car for something newer soon, and once you put the hourly rate/overheads of someone competent on top of the basic cost of a towbar kit, especially for a nicer/newer/shinier car, that you actually want to look after ~£700+ starts to seem kinda reasonable.

Plus I have other roof carrier solutions already and that £700-800 can pay for an awful lot of inefficiently burned fuel before the lack of a tow bar becomes a real concern.

Cost sounds about right for your spec. As has been said, you could get it cheaper if you went fixed and can put up with your parking sensors going crazy every time you reverse with it on – we had generic wiring on the last car but bit the bullet and went vehicle specific on the current one seeing it was a long-termer (5 years and counting).

Just got one fitted to my 2019 Golf. Bought the towbar for £130 brand new on Ebay and got a guy to fit it on my driveway for £170 without the electrics. He said he’ll do that for another £80.

He had it done in under an hour. He told me obviously some cars are easier than others and that Range rovers have approximately 150 fasteners that need undone an redone ?

Yep £800 three years ago Canbus kit.

I’ve booked one. It’s expensive but they’re local and they can fit it on the drive on Tuesday before I leave for France on Thursday night.

I’m paying £840 for a detachable Westfalia with the correct wiring and they’ll do any coding or programming that’s required. The car is still in warranty and has parking sensors, DSG etc. I didn’t want to trigger any gremlins by splicing in a generic wiring kit. If it was just nuts and bolts I would have done it myself no worries. It’s a one off cost and we’re planning to keep the car until petrol is illegal.

I feel relieved to have something lined up. I think I was mostly stressing about the amount of unfinished jobs I’m currently dealing with.

Hopefully I’ll be riding Pleney in the sun this time next Friday.

As a result of this thread we paid £500 for a detachable inc. fitting from JIB towbars in the Midlands. Got a detachable because of the reversing sensors.

Their quote in my email was:

Fixed Flange Towbar c/w 13 Pin Universal Electrics is £400.00 (May affect Rear Parking Sensors)

Detachable Swan Neck Towbar c/w 13 Pin Universal Electrics is £500.00

this thread* we paid £500

*2 years ago 🙂