How much do all of you think my 88 T Bird V6 could tow? I asked several FoMoCo dealers to no avail. I want to tow a 1200# trailer.
Hehehe, tow with a v6. The only way to find out is to try. But I personaly don't think it will work well. You might be fine on flat ground, but up a hill, well that is a different story. My v6 cougar can barely tow itself up a hill :giggle:
According to the owner's manual, 2000 pounds is the maximum. Anything over 1000 pounds you need a tranny cooler. I towed my four-wheeler and trailer all last summer and had no problems (granted, my car is 5.0), but I do wish the thing had better brakes. I'll be doing the 11" front brake conversion for just that reason
Towing in OD is not recommended.
The question isn't how much you can tow, it's how much you can stop. I would be concerned with the braking ability of a stock setup with a heavy load. I have seen a 87 5.0 cougar tow a good size camper before, up and down hills without much trouble. Its ass was sagging but it seemed to pull it just fine, but the 5.0 has more torque. I would say if your on flat ground most of the time go for it, but if there are many hills involved I personally wouldn't do it.
Can you say head gaskets!!!!!!!!! :D
I would not tow a 1200 pound trailer in a Bird or Cat. Too much to consider - your brakes, tires, the engine and trans, etc.
Chris
Put in a tranny cooler if you tow anything (or even if you don't tow at all). Even 2000lbs would be fine if you drive sensable. You may be under the vehicals tow limits, but over the limits for your ability. At work I often pull 10,000lbs over the limit of my F250, but logically I'm going a lot slower, and keeping much farther lead distances.
Factory tow rating are very conservative in all vehicals, unfortunalty most drivers are not. If takes longer to stop, more room to manover, less speed, and you cannot make emergeny manovers (if you wanna keep the trailer behind you :) )
If you tow a lot, especially in hills, a transmition temp gauge would be benificial too.
edit: I'm not trying to insult anybodies driving abilities here, Ive just seem a lot of serious towing accidents, especially with weekend warriors pulling boats or campers.
1200lbs will be fine behind a cougar, just take it easy.
And don't let Lucy hide any "souvenir" boulders in the trailer.
http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0047191/
Whats great is the 99-04 (somewhere in there) mustang I saw with a trailer hitch a couple weeks ago. Looked so wrong :wtf:
I had no problem towing a little boat with my old car...
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:laughing: :laughing: :laughing: :laughing: :bs:
Of course the boats engines had to be running and in about 6ft of water for the thing to move... :giggle:
Years ago I towed a U-Cart trailer with a yard of concrete behind a '67 Falcon. I had a 351 from a '69 Torino in it so gettin' going wasn't a problem. But getting it stopped was a different story, since it had drum brakes all around.
Doesn't sound like a good idea with the V6. V8 you'll be fine. When I had my 1996 cat (4.6) I used to tow up to 1900-2100 lbs with it (2K maximum limit) with no problems. Stopped fine and never overheated. I did have however:
3.73's
aluminum driveshaft
tranny cooler
'03 cobra radiator
shift kit
chip
Needless to say, it was a very fun car to tow with :) I could uphill @ 80 mph in O/D with a load 1500lb + behind me and 2 people in the car without even unlocking the converter!
reminds me of when I was little seeing this little bmw go flying past us as we got on the freeway headed up to the moutains. About 20 mins late my dad passed him , he was going around 60, with our station wagon going about 80 uphill with a trailer cartop carrier and a total of 8 passengers.
i'll check the owners manul and shop manual when i get home. but i beleive the towing limit on the 6 cyl was 1200# and 1800 # V-8 but either way trans cooler trans cooler trans cooler.
I just looked at my '88 owner's manual, & it doesn't show anything about a Class 2 hitch, which mine has, but it does mention a Class 1, with a 2000# gross trailer weight limit & a 200# tongue weight. The info applies to both 3.8 & 5.0 engines.
Class 2 hitches are limited by the powers that be to 3500# trailer weight & 350# tongue weight, but the manual does not mention them at all, only Class 1.
The 2.3 turbo engines have a bold-print warning to not tow a trailer at all because it will cause engine damage. A local Ford shop foreman told me the guy who brought his TC in for a warranty repair on his smoking 2.3 got a $3000+ shock when he came to pick it up. Seems it had a trailer hitch on it, & his warranty promptly got voided. OUCH!!!
The manual also says a trailer weighing over 1000# should have brakes. Having pulled an 1800-pounder (empty weight) a few times, I'd say it's not such a bad idea. The only time I ever had a real problem was when I had the tailgate (expanded-metal) vertical & it got a little squirrelly on the freeway. Something about trying to drag the broad side of a barn down the road at 75mph, I guess. It also tends to get the temp gauge up to the high side of normal, too. Tossing the tailgate onto the trailer floor fixed it right up.
It also warns if you're in hilly country & it hunts between 3rd & 4th gears, to put it in D until you get back in the flatland. I personally never use OD when towing, hell I rarely use it when not towing.
That is because without boost the 2.3 barely has enough hp to pull the car. Hanging a trailer on it and keeping the turbo spooled up is gonna fry the turbo and/or engine.
You could probably get away with a small trailer pulling A Jet Ski or two on level ground, but not in the mountains.
Get a truck.
I not getting a truck! I ended using my company truck to tow the trailer instead. I just thought a RWD vehicle could easily do it.
My LTD towed several small, fully loaded 5x8' U-hauls and open 5x10' trailers on 100 mile highway trips and city streets with no trouble, no tranny cooler AND used OD once I was cruising on flat land. It ran smooth at 65-70 mph, and got about 17 mpg highway. The engine operated at about 200 instead of 190 and I manually shifted the trans from D to OD when I felt necessary. This was from the years of '99-03. Engine and trans still run fine to this day.
I'm more than sure you can do it. When my 84 Turbo coupe was my buddies and it had the old evething motor, brakes, clutch. We towed a 85 ceilca just fine and we also towed a 87 VW golf GTi. Both times we had no problems. When we rented the car dolly the U-hual guy did ask what we were gonna tow and we lied and told him both cars had no motor or tranny and we said that would be below the 1200lbs his book gave. Mine came with the hitch when my buddy bought it. chcek it out
didn't read all the posts, fyi.
I towed some pretty heavy stuff with my old 5.0 cfi, i never had a problem 'cept for rear end sag with heavy loads. not sure about a 3.8..