First-world problem: tow vehicle.

Hope everyone's summer of racing/auto-x/rally/drifting/hooning is going well. I've been doing SCCA road racing and am having a blast.

As you all know too well, the dark underbelly of the hobby that no prepares you for (except for GRM of course), is the acquisition of "stuff" required to feed, maintain and facilitate this addiction.

Case in point: the dreaded tow vehicle.

I've been fortunate enough to have a family member willing to loan a decent, but not optimal tow rig (Chevy Suburban) to tow my enclosed trailer and car to the races. Just had a scare with the transmission needing repair that got me thinking long-term about a tow-vehicle solution.

The money issue aside, the reality is that even if I decided to get a truck to do the towing, the thing would literally sit dormant except for the 7-8 times per year that I would tow the racecar. No matter how much or little I spend on the rig, this seems neither cost efficient nor good for the rig (letting it sit and rot unused parked outside in our wonderful, dry sunny Pacific NW weather for 98% of the year).

Do any of you who have gon ethrough this have any bright ideas? Rental of a tow vehicle (if places even rent for hauling trailers), share a truck with a friend, just borrow a rig from a friend? Any "out of the box" solutions would be greatly appreciated. Thanks!

/Rich

If you where closer to ill, wis I could help out....but since you on the wrong side of the country I can not..sigh

In reply to rcl4668:

I would add that our family also has an SUV (an Audi Q7 TDI -- the diesel) but my mechanic tells me it also is not an optimal tow rig nor would my spouse be thrilled with using it for my hobby given that it is also the kiddie hauler of the family). Again, thanks for reading and for any suggestions.

I like driving our truck so I don't know what to tell you. I grew up in a pickup family. Many times the only vehicle we owned as a kid was a pickup. I'm lost without one.

No need for a general truck? Best Lowe's runner, mulch hauler, friend moving vehicle ever. Owning a cheap truck means I can daily driver a much smaller, more fuel efficient car. It costs me about $20/month in insurance. Not sure I could get away with renting a truck even twice on $120.

Uhaul rents half ton trucks for $19.95 plus mileage.

rcl4668 wrote: In reply to rcl4668: I would add that our family also has an SUV (an Audi Q7 TDI -- the diesel) but my mechanic tells me it also is not an optimal tow rig nor would my spouse be thrilled with using it for my hobby given that it is also the kiddie hauler of the family). Again, thanks for reading and for any suggestions.

Knowing this... I'll play "what if".

A Q7 TDI tow ratings are ~6,000 lbs. if properly equipped. I would certainly think you could use that (though downsizing trailer may be required... or open trailer). A Q7 TDI is a pretty serious (and expensive) piece of equipment to own if you're never towing anything with it. What is your daily driver... and couldn't she just use that on the weekends to haul the kids around if you're gone? We're looking to end up in a similar position and are considering a Flex EcoBoost for my wife's daily which will serve double duty as the weekend toy tow hauler without having to have an additional vehicle around.

The other answer then is... Is it feasible for you to daily drive something that could pull double duty as a legit trailer hauler? For me this isn't really feasible as I drive ridiculous mileage so I need the MPG's. My wife is a stay at home mom so her vehicle efficiency hardly matters.

As for rentals and such, I have no idea.

Just drive it once a week anyways. It'll be fine.

mw wrote: Uhaul rents half ton trucks for $19.95 plus mileage.

Our local UHaul at least won't let you tow their own trailers with their regular pick-up trucks. If you want to rent the whole tow rig you have to rent a 14' box truck just for towing.

tpwalsh wrote: No need for a general truck? Best Lowe's runner, mulch hauler, friend moving vehicle ever. Owning a cheap truck means I can daily driver a much smaller, more fuel efficient car. It costs me about $20/month in insurance. Not sure I could get away with renting a truck even twice on $120.

And if not truck, van.

mw wrote: Uhaul rents half ton trucks for $19.95 plus $0.49/mile

Fixed.

That would make one of my normal autocross sites a $100/trip rental fee.

tpwalsh wrote:

mw wrote: Uhaul rents half ton trucks for $19.95 plus $0.49/mile

Fixed. That would make one of my normal autocross sites a $100/trip rental fee.

Depends, if you rent a truck for 24h you get better mileage rates and more miles included.

In reply to BoxheadTim:

Odd, I thought about that, 4 hours, 24 hours, 2 days and 3 days are all 0.49/mile in my location. (NC)

Find cheap old-school ex phone company/contractor E150/250, G20/2500, or Dodge Tradesman/RamVan. Put a suitable hitch on it if none exists already. Drive it once a week when you are not using it to keep the rot away. Buy cheap parts to replace whatever breaks when you use it. Sell for what you paid for it when you are done cause you bought it so cheap.

Renting is not a bad deal either, i think Enterprise will rent said van for a reasonable rate. Their pickups in my neck of the woods go for $63 per day unlimited mileage.

If he can get his race car to the track for $7-800 a year, that's a good deal in my opinion. Since with a rental, he doesn't need to buy, insure, maintain, or store the vehicle. Some of the other rental companies have better deals especially if you can get a corporate account.

If I had a 5th wheel hauler.. I found the perfect tow vehicle. The "buy here, pay here" place down the road has an old towtruck. Yank out the tow rig and bolt in a 5th wheel mount.. you could even leave the Tow truck body in place for storage of necessary stuff

tpwalsh wrote: In reply to BoxheadTim: Odd, I thought about that, 4 hours, 24 hours, 2 days and 3 days are all 0.49/mile in my location. (NC)

Might be location dependent. We occasionally rent a van to go to Ikea so we can slowly fill the house with furniture. If we rent the van for 24h the cost goes up but it suddenly includes 100 miles and the mileage rate drops to something like 19c a mile. Given that it's a good 250 miles to Ikea and back that makes a substantial difference over their 19.95 + 49c/mile tariff.

How big is your trailer? How long is your average tow? When I was club racing, the average tow of 6 hrs and a 20ft trailer in the mountains of N Ga, NC and E Tenn meant that I needed a serious tow vehicle and it became our best vehicle as a SUV and I drove beater RX-7's and Miata along with other sports cars for my DD. BTW it is very hard to beat a 'Burb as a tow vehicle. It is very difficult in the long haul to make a 1/2 ton vehicle work if you have a heavy load and long tow. You will hear of guys that do it with a Nissan pu but I wasnt that brave and had to be at work on Monday. YMMV

ckosacranoid, thanks for the offer.

F350 crew, long box, gas, 2000 and up less than 5k here (ATL) all day. Bonus for 4x4, gas trucks can sit longer without as many problems, and less initial cost. FTW!

In reply to clownkiller:

Nice, frankly if I could find a truck like that out here in the Pacific NW that might change my mind about buying. It seems that, just as when I was searching for used encloed trailers, those in the south or southwestern part of the country were relatively inexpensive compared to prices in my neck of the woods. It seems like trucks with the specs I would need seem to go for more like $8,000-$12,000 out here.

Thanks for all of the other replies. To add more infor to the mix:

My current trailer is a 24' x 8.5' enclosed model that the Suburban struggles with a bit. My average tow ranges from PIR (45 minutes) to up to 3-4 hours for Pacific Raceways, the Ridge Motorsports Park or Oregon Raceway Park. I would eventually like to try som eraces at Thunderhill, Laguna Seca which would not only add considerably more time but also some "interesting" driving through high elevations through the mountains.

Unfortunately, I have discussed the option of using our Q7 for trailering with my spouse and that is not an option given the number of kiddos we have and the fact that she uses the Q7 very often to get the kids to their various commitments/sports, etc. My wife also detests my daily driver, an E39 M5, because "it drives funny and is twitchy on the highway." I have learned the hard way not to argue with these sorts of comments.

In terms of buying a truck as my daily driver, my job entails a fair amount of long distance driving and I would prefer not to have to do all that driving in a truck.

Keep the suggestions coming, they are very helpful.

/Rich

This is what I did a couple of months ago.

F350 Crew cab dually with a 460 gas engine.

It pulls my 20' enclosed like it isn't even there and my father's 35' 5th wheel camper with no problem. It was $3k. I've gone through the brakes and put tires on it. It sits 99% of the time so gas mileage is a moot point. Honestly fuel economy isn't much worse than my E150 got with the enclosed, 7 mpg vs 8 mpg. You can fix it with a hammer and a pair of vice grips and it doesn't have any options to fail other than A/C and power windows. I'm keeping an eye out for a slide in camper for it. Then it will be goodbye hotel rooms.

rcl4668 wrote: In terms of buying a truck as my daily driver, my job entails a fair amount of long distance driving and I would prefer not to have to do all that driving in a truck. Keep the suggestions coming, they are very helpful. /Rich

I can understand that, but maybe go take an extended test drive in modern 1/2 ton crew cab pickup. I think you might be surprised just how nice/comfortable the more optioned ones are.

But they are big vehicles to be driving on a daily basis.

the local Uhaul here will let you rent a pickup or a van with their trailers...

U-haul pickup and van rentals usually don't come with trailer hitches and almost invariably come with a "no towing" clause in the rental contract. Same with the consumer part of Enterprise. I'm told that Enterprise corporate rental allows towing, but I don't know what you have to do to qualify for that.

A rental half-ton isn't going to tow any better than the Suburban, anyway. Personally I wouldn't try to tow a 24' enclosed trailer with a half-ton.

I dunno if this qualifies as "out of the box", but I'd suggest pulling out excel and doing some math on what it actually costs to own one.

For example, I bought a 3/4 ton diesel. The way I look at it, since I only put about 4K miles a year on it (towing to events roughly once a month, plus I drive it to work occasionally just to make sure it gets run at least once every couple weeks), and I bought it with 125K miles and 10 years old, it's really not depreciating much. Add up registration, depreciation, maintenance, and insurance (4K miles a year on a 4th vehicle doesn't cost much), and it's probably only costing around a grand a year to own, which is less than I'd be spending to rent something like that once a month (even if I could find someone who'd rent one to me). Plus it's really convenient to have a truck around for occasional trips to Home Depot or the like.

(I'm not including fuel costs in my calculation because I'd be paying those even if I were renting something)