A-Frame Towing Europe

Stability is just one issue of many. There are other aspects of safety which need to be addressed before A-frame towing can be considered a viable solution without any reservation and I suspect that no-one is going to invest time and money to regulate such a system in view of the low volumes involved and certainly not on the Continent.

Dual posting

My opinion is that towing a car over a long distance either by rope, or A frame, is not a kind thing to do to a car.

To my way of thinking that the gears, synchromesh, and clutch are all driven onto the back edge of the gearing. When driven normally the drive train is used as designed, clutch gearbox, wheels,  Not in reverse. It seems a recipe for silver oil, not that gearbox oil is changed much nowadays.

Add in the rubbing of the brakes, and associated friction surfaces, Using a trailer seems a better choice, if you have the sufficient capacity for car and trailer.

rgds

Not quite correct, only part of the gearbox is being driven, but lubricated in the normal way (boundary lubrication) so no harm done, Clutch, which is attached to the flywheel remains stationary as does the input side of the gearbox  (otherwise the engine would be forced to turn) In reality no different to driving the car but not using any fuel because the engine is not running.

Most auto's ( there are some exceptions) are different though as the Torque Converter normally drives a pump that lubricates the gearbox and needs the engine running to do this. Hence why autos are not towed but transported, put on a dolly or the driven wheels lifted, or in the case of larger vehicles, Prop shafts are disconnected or half shafts removed 

Drag on the front tyres and steering is not what it is designed to do when cornering but again no big deal when you think about what affect our road surfaces put it through 

SUMMING UP
After reading many forums on this subject here in the UK according to Dept of Transport (see below extract)
https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/a-frames-and.../a-frames-and-dollies
When an A-frame is attached to a vehicle (eg a motor car) and towed by a motor vehicle (eg motorhome) we believe the A-frame and car become a single unit and as such are classified in legislation as a trailer.

Q1\ Does your A-frame and car assembly meet all the legal requirements for a Trailer?
Q2\ Does your cars modification change the appearance of the front of the car (any protrusions)?
Q3\ Type Approval introduced from April 2013?

If your answers are
Q1\ YES Q2\ NO Q3\ Car and A-Frame Pre 2013
Totally Legal
Q1\ NO Q2\ YES or NO Q3\ Car and A-Frame Pre 2013
Totally ILLegal
Q1\ YES Q2\ YES Q3\ Car and A-Frame Pre 2013
Towing Legal but Car driven alone could be ILLegal
Q1\ YES Q2\ NO Q3\ Car and A-Frame After April 2013
Unsure what Type Aproval might affect

If we can all agree with my summing up I might even have a go at European Law.

Not quite true of all manuals Milothedog, certainly some Mazda MX5s lunched their gearboxes because they depended on the input shaft to lubricate the rest of the box, probably not the best design but others may be the same. I still think TonyIshUK is correct.

 Paul1951, if you replace totally legal with theoretically legal but not 100% proven then I may agree. They are 100% not totally legal, don't believe what the salesman tells you.

The legality referred to by the DOT statement is only their opinion. There is no law specifically covering the use of A-frames, nor has any court reached a verdict, so it remains a grey area in the UK.

The April 2013 breakpoint only refers to the need for the complete A-frame plus car unit to be type approved as a trailer. To my knowledge, no manufacturer has gone through such type approval procedure. Note that any modifications to the towcar to provide anchorage points for an A-frame would affect its type approval as well and that was already in effect before April 2013. It is not sufficient just to show that such modifications don't change the appearance of the car, as the above response suggests. Structual modifications under the surface also need to taken into account.

I can't see where there is a case for taking the issue up in 'European law', whatever that means. A decision probably wouldn't be reached before Brexit anyway, and it's anybody's guess what the situation will be like afterwards.

I don't need to tow a car on an A frame but have friends who considered this and the advice, that they heeded, was that whilst OK here it was not in Europe.

The reason given, and published in MMM, was that in the UK if there is no law against it then you can do it BUT in most of Europe unless there is a law that says you can, then you cant.

They chose to get a scooter and use a rack and have now got a bigger scooter on a trailer.

If I was in the OPs position I would also seek to find a way to holiday that suited me but, for me, the thought of a holiday ruined by being told by a man, probably with a gun, that what I was doing was not allowed would be enough to persuade me to find another way.  

One would hope that they made the owner aware of this in the handbook?

I did, in my explanation try to take a generic approach which is the case generally, but as you point out there is always an exception as I said with some of the smaller autos. 

Either way, it's not an issue I will have to consider because I prefer to just un hitch and set up for the duration of our stay leaving us the car to use. But we all like different things

Absolutely right dog, It's down to the individual in the end.

I just wanted to point out that some cars that you would expect to be fine sometimes are not. Fundamentally no car is designed to be towed using an A-Frame, it's just that some are better suited than others. 

Personally I'd love someone to bring out a frame that fits without changing the front crossbeam, but I can't see it happening. The problem I can see with buying an A-Frame now is that they're more expensive than a trailer, I was quoted almost £3k for an AYGO conversion. The newer braking systems from the US are really good, but very expensive, and even more intrusive fit to the car. 

There is no perfect solution, only the one that best suits you.