Towing uphill and off-road: a word of caution

Dave Darmody, owner and lead trainer of Australian Offroad Academy offers up some words of caution on towing uphill off-road.

As will become obvious as we break down each of the aspects of driving our 4WD and our home on wheels with us, there’s a bit of a Dunning Krueger thing going on with towing uphill. I’d like to consider myself a bit of an expert on the DK effect, y’know… if you are too, you got that!

Anyway, let’s think of folks towing off-road uphill as fitting into three broad (and probably overlapping) categories.

There are those who are brand new and acknowledge, at least if only to themselves, that they are a bit daunted by the prospect. There are those who’ve done a bit of real off-road, uphill towing and watched lots of their heroes on youtube. And there are those who have plenty of experience, and plenty of that experience has involved times when things absolutely did not go as planned.

I’ll revisit where each of these folks sit on the DK graph at a later date, but let’s just consider a couple of scenarios.

Let’s consider a couple of off-road uphill towing scenarios

Please humour me by joining me in the assumption that both the car and trailer are physically and geometrically capable of the task at hand.

Consider a properly steep hill climb in which the only factor is the gradient. The surface is not rough and rutted, there are no side slopes and the weather is good. The track is not unduly narrow either. There are a couple of turns, maybe even a steep drop-off thrown in for a bit of excitement.

This uphill towing scenario just needs you to engage some thoughtfulness and low range (and lock the centre diff if you’re in a full-time 4WD). If you’re still swinging a manual, you’ll need to bank on some of your experience with your car in choosing first or second. However, you’ll be making a choice which you’ll need to live with at the bottom, cresting the top, and everywhere in the middle.

You see, in your manual, your clutch is not your friend once you start ascending. If you’ve chosen a gear too high and your combination is incapable of the task, you’ll need to force a stall. But that’s a topic for its own edition. If you’ve picked a gear too low, that’s ok. It’ll just take you a bit longer, and you’ll have that extra time to learn for next time.

If you’re in a clever auto, resist the temptation to out-think your car by locking yourself into manual mode. You’ll get the knack of putting out just enough throttle to make the gearbox do what you want when you want.

There’s nothing particularly special happening on this hill, you’re learning about your gearbox and about your low-range reduction and having an excellent adventure.

Let’s add a new element, shall we?

Now, let’s add water to this uphill towing scanario.

Let’s say that the track has been knocked around by erosion. As happens, the steeper the hill, the greater the velocity of the water running down it, and therefore the greater the potential for that water to start creating some mini grand canyons. These will present a challenge in the dry, but let’s say that it’s still raining.

Newbie vs middle group vs experienced

This is where our three categories of drivers are going to think about this uphill towing obstacle a bit differently from each other.

You see, our newbie will be having serious doubts looking at this hill, as they should. They will be attempting to walk up and check it out. Their doubt will be wide-ranging from whether they should drop their tyre pressure more (the answer to that is quite likely yes) to whether the trailer will follow the tow car if it drops a wheel into one of those ruts that they’re planning to expertly avoid. They’ll also be wondering what this is going to be like to drive back down if the track gets worse or if they are forced to reverse back the same way.

Our newbie will spend some time, assuming no peer pressure, weighing up these thoughts and risks. They’ll likely decide that they could look for an alternative to towing uphill in this particular spot, or choose that cute little, high-and-dry campground they went past a little way back.

Our experienced drivers will already have many of these thoughts circulating and if they’ve already seen the consequences of some slideways action of car and trailer in the steep and wet stuff, they’ll likely come to the same conclusion as the newbie.

Our middle group though, emboldened by their successful drives so far, but not tempered by the experiences which make memories for different reasons, is more likely to set upon a path of discovery and some forced learning.

Where am I going with this?

Where am I going with this? It’s 100% okay to choose not to drive a big, wet, rutted and slippery hill. And it’s definitely not only folks who are new to off-roading who choose the ‘safe’ option. In other words, you can say no to towing uphill if it’s not safe.

The hill, and whatever is over it, will still be there the next day or on your next visit. Maybe it’ll just go into your ‘unfinished business’ file. There’s always another time and it’s always more fun when we bring home all the bits in the right places.