Our Jeep
This is our chosen tow vehicle, a 2017 Jeep Grand Cherokee Trailhawk. A very comfortable and very capable vehicle. We left home in May 2021 with 111,000km on the clock and returned home at 185,000km in May 2024 (exactly 3 years later). Its currently March 2025 and we are at 201,000km and still going strong. I am going to get a major service done now, get all the rubber coolant hoses replaced, oil seal on the oil cooler, inlet manifold clean and another Transmission service. Apart from that can’t fault it.
Engine:
The Trailhawk features a 3.0 L V6 Turbo Diesel engine, with:
- 184kW (240hp) of power at 3600 rpm, and,
- 570Nm (420 ft-lb) of torque at 2000 rpm.
These figures make this an ideal tow vehicle for a larger van.
Air Suspension:
The Trailhawk also feature full air suspension, shown above in entry/exit mode, it offers:
- Full time four corner automatic load levelling
- Closed type air suspension design using Nitrogen, results in fast ride height changes
- Ability to change ride height with the push of a button
- Max ground clearance 10.7″
- 4.1in (104mm) between lowest to highest settings
- Park mode lowers vehicle for easier entry & exit (as pictured above)
- Normal Ride Height (NRH) is 1.5in (38mm) higher than Park Mode
- Automatically lowers 0.5in (12mm) at highway speeds (or Sports Mode) to reduce drag resulting in better fuel economy
- Improved off-road performance by increasing ground clearance with 2 settings:
- Off-Road I is 1.3in (33mm) higher than NRH
- Off-Road II is 2.6in (66mm) higher than NRH
Towing Capabilities, pretty good!
The Jeep is an often overlooked but very capable tow vehicle. It sits very comfortably on the road and has a true 3500kg towing capacity. The only downfall for us is the Trailhawk is the heaviest Tare of them all (with the air suspension, underbody bash plates etc) so it leaves only 609kg Payload, This has to include the Driver, Passengers, luggage, fuel (93L tank), accessories (including tow bar) and of course the Ball Weight. So a larger van with over 300kg ball weigh consumes half of that straight away. Add another 68kg for a full tank (tare includes 10L) and 40kg for the tow-bar and you are down to just over 201kg for people and luggage. Fortunately we are only lightweights and all gear is stored in the van. We have also moved things around to try and keep the ball weight around 270kg on a total van weight of about 3100kg (no water in tanks) – at this weight it tows very nicely.
The numbers:
- Tare 2340kg
- GVM 2949kg
- GCM 6099
- Maximum towing 3500kg
- Maximum ball weight 350kg
- Front axle limit 1452kg
- Rear axle limit 1678kg
Jeep recommend using a Weight Distribution Hitch (WDH) when towing over 2268kg (5000lb) to assist with vehicle handling and rear axle load limits. We use the Andersen / Anderson WDH, I have covered that in a separate post.
Hi Dave
Trust all is well. A great summary about the jeep.
Quick question. What tyres do you have on the jeep and do you recommend noting if they seem suitable for road, beach and off-road. How many Kms travelled on a set?
Cheers Anthony
Hey Anthony, tyres currently are Hankook Dynapro AT-M RF10. The new version is the RF11. They had replaced 2 tyres when I bought the vehicle at 93,000km, the other two were still originals and just barely legal but should have been replaced too, so I hunted around and had them replaced as well with matching tyres. I have run them on the rears at 40psi cold when towing wich gives a slightly stiffer ride but feels much more in control and about 35 all round when not towing. As we are now at 154,000km, they currently have just over 61,000km and at a guess will get another 20k or so. They are an OK all round tyre, quiet but not particularly great in the wet (a little too easy to slide, expected for a longer wearing tyre), are great in the sand being not too agressive, OK off road on mild tracks, not real flash in the mud – also because they are not too agressive! Well priced – I paid about $277 each fitted – bought online from Tyroola and fitted by alocal tyre shop. I would buy them again as they do suit our needs.
Hope that helps! Cheers, Dave.
Hello Dave, My name is Derek and I have been caravanning for over 30 years and have covered quite some miles towing over the time and I am so impressed with your knowledge of all things caravans and towing and loved reading all the tech stuff . I to have a Trail Hawk diesel, which I love and mines a 2018 and its White just like yours and just recently had it all weighed up professionally with our 21 ft Paramount caravan weighing in at 3190 (water tanks full) and got quite a shock to see my rear axle weight is over by 30kg, and there’s only a chair in the back plus the trail mate and it had a full tank of fuel and us on board, the tow bar ball weight is 315kg I can fix this by taking out my Genie which is in the front boot and I will start using WDH again , just goes to show you how easy it is to go over , my car weights and van weights are good , got a pass for all that ,just the rear axle. And just wondering how the jeep is performing on this great adventure your on and any issues with the car and was interested to see that the WDH is compatible with our air suspension.
Good health and safe travels. Regards Derek.
Hey Derek, thanks for the kind words!
Yep, it’s a real balancing act keeping the weights in check. I found once over 270 to 280kg the rear axle and GVM were getting close. That happens when the front water tank is full.. Unfortunately the Trailhawk also has an extra 70kg of steel bash plates, and ours had steel step sliders at 50kg added by the previous owners too.
Only issues so far have been: a leaking elbow join in the front air suspension that I fixed a few days ago but now have an issue with it needing calibration and still to work out how to do that properly; a really tiny nail in a tyre so small I couldn’t find it; and a headlight globe blew yesterday.
Thats it! Just over 2 years and 53,000km on the road now!
Hi Dave – I have a rig very similar to you and have been reluctant to use a WDH due to lack of clarity regarding using one with my Jeep’s QUADRA Lift Air Suspension. I was pleased to find someone who has used one and not had any issues. I see in your article you have published an article regarding WDH with the Quadra lift. Could you send me a link to the article please? Regards Pete
Hey Peter, no probs at all! This should get you there: https://www.andaroundwego.com/caravan-mods/weight-distribution-hitch/
Yes, the ride with the WDH is much better. 79,000km around Aus and about 38,000 of that towing the van with WDH!
Hi Dave – I had a read of your article regarding the WDH and found it very informative. Can you tell me how easy/quick it is to release the Anderson WDH to travel through deep dips such as getting into Servos where there are deep drainage channels at the entrance. Also as my rig is a Jeep with Quadra lift like yours will I need to make the modification you made?
Hey Peter, I never actually disconnected for dips like that. I did disconnect before any off road or beach stuff, but on the road I never bothered and it never gave me any issue.
However to release, generally I used the jockey wheel (has a BOS470 drill operated) to lift the front of the van and back of car together, that was usually enough to release the tension off the chains then you simply remove the pin holding the triangle plate to the tow hitch and drop the triangle plate. If you have to do it manually, I used a shifter to undo the adjusting nuts at the end of the chains, about 3 to 5 turns and chains are loose, then same thing to remove the triangle plate. Once one side chain is loose the other is too. The thing I loved about the Andersen was no limit on tight turns or reversing, but only worked on a 50mm ball. I believe they have just released a D035 version though, but the ball would be my preference.
Thanks Dave – I looking at changing vans so I appreciate your help. Do you know what the actual weight of the Anderson is so I can factor it into my tow ball weight calculations when assessing my next van in terms of maximum atm. Pete
From memory it was 26kg total, including the chains and brackets etc., though I guess they all need to be taken into account and added to the ball weight. I do remember it was a good 10 plus kg lighter than the HR I had previously.
Hi Dave, i have never owned a caravan and both my wife and i are keen to dwell into this new venture. My question to you, we have brought a 2018 Jeep Grand Cherokee Trailhawk obviously has air suspension. The caravan we are looking at purchasing is a Prime Edge off road with air suspension max ATM =3500, Tare weight 2915 kg with optional extras we have added and approximate ball weight from factory is 100 kg . We have calculated that the van when fully loaded water. clothes, food, cooking /cutlery ect comes in at 3450 kg I have estimated the jeep with a full tank of fuel, 2 passengers , 100 liter water bladder and allowed extra 50 kg for other items, so my total GCM = 6080 kg . How i have come to this figure is the caravan =3450kg ATM and Jeep 2630kg ATM I have been told that the ball weight once caravan is loaded will increase to 250kg /300 kg
I .can reduce my GCM by removing the 100 liter bladder in the jeep and will reduce the GCM to 5980 kg. My concern is the rear Axel load on the jeep coming in at 1678 kg from your experience with your jeep will i encounter issues with the load on thee rear axels ?
Hey Tony, welcome to the madness! You will be skirting right at the absolute maximums with a van that size. Ours had a 935kg payload and we struggled to keep it under with full time travel. Yes, once our ball weight came to over 270kg there was pretty much nothing left to remove from the Jeep to keep it under the legal limit. Over 300kg ball weight and Jeep was over if I filled the fuel tank. WDH cranked up tight to reduce rear axle weights. I would generally travel with the front most water tank in the van empty to keep ball weight around 260kg max, only around 30kg of gear in the Jeep plus me and the wife @150kg for the pair of us. That put it right at the limits. We do have 50kg of rock sliders, roof bars and an awning though, without all of them would make a difference. With the van at its max 3355kg we were constantly struggling to keep weights in check. If we go again I would like to see a van at or below 3000kg max and ball weight at 250kg max.
As for the water bladder, we have a 140kg, only ever filled it after dropping the van off. Not a hope of having it full as well!