this post was submitted on 12 Jun 2024
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I'm saying that to pull heavy loads they need active cooling. And they do. They also have cooling when not designed for heavy pulling, but they don't need as much cooling because all the mechanics you literally agree with me over: More cooling is needed under heavier loads. This isn't some far-out concept it's physics, it's what happens when you put oil in essentially a blender, it gets hot.
Then, and this seems to get ignored by you: Americans aren't pulling heavy loads with cars. Why? Do you have an alternative explanation?
1270 kg over here (with trailer brakes, 12% incline). That's nearly twice. Tongue weight: 80kg. That's less.
And that's a Japanese SUV. You can get VW Golfs with 1.8t towing capacity, that's a compact car. Also pure combustion ones, the Crosstrek is a hybrid it's easy to get low-end torque with one of those and transmission is a whole another topic.
That's why trailer brakes exist and don't pretend 140km/h are fast... though with a trailer you're generally limited to 80 or 100 here, depending on make and whatnot. Maybe you should introduce speed limits, regulations for brakes on trailers, etc. Maybe you would if your small cars could even tow that much, physically. You should also start to use the left lane for overtaking only and get rid of those ludicrous amounts of stop signs and build your cities so that people can move in them, not just cars, but I'm digressing.
1200 kg isn't a heavy load.
For a lorry, no. For a private vehicle, yes. Standard driving licenses only allow for up to 3.5t combined permissible weight (that is, vehicle and trailer plus maximum load), 750kg of those for trailer and load. If you want to drive a combination of vehicle and trailer individually up to 3.5t (so total 7t) you need a trailer license, anything above that you need a lorry license with all bells and whistles such as regular medical checkups.
Or, differently put: A standard VW Golf can pull almost thrice as much as most drivers are allowed to pull.
A small load for a private vehicle would be a small empty caravan, or a light trailer with some bikes. A Smart Fourtwo can pull 550kg which will definitely look silly but is otherwise perfectly reasonable, that's enough for both applications.
What a sad country.
Also, towing heavy, actually heavy, not 1200 kg, went away in cars about 1990. Emissions regulations, really. 1985 olds, Chrysler, could safely yank around a 4500 kilogram horse trailer. That all went away, now it's cars that could maybe 1000 lbs amd trucks that can pull 5 to 15000 kg loads. Btw, the old auto tow transmissions like the hydromatic 400, didn't have a lock up at all. Jaguar used to buy them.from Chevy for use in the old XJS v12s .