Golf Mk7 Towing/Towbar Thread

[b c]

My dealer tells me he can't get VW Aus to even say "yes" or "no" when asked if they will be providing a tow bar for the Golf ....

Love the car, but I have problems saying anything positive about VW Aus' approach to customers...

[DV52]

My dealer tells me he can't get VW Aus to even say "yes" or "no" when asked if they will be providing a tow bar for the Golf ....

Love the car, but I have problems saying anything positive about VW Aus' approach to customers...

b.c. : You have certainly been waiting for a tow bar for a very long time and I entirely agree with your sentiments about the inaptly named "Customer Car" folk at VW Australia. In the 21st century I would have thought that getting a model specific tow bar on the market wouldn't have been all that difficult - it ain't rocket science!

Your understandable annoyance at VW Australia's deplorable lack-of-action notwithstanding, the extended delay does raise an interesting question; If you have tolerated not having a tow-bar for this long period of time, do you really need one?

In my case, I went for the Hayman Reece tow bar in desperation, but this doesn't appear to be the case for you.

[b c]

b.c. : You have certainly been waiting for a tow bar for a very long time and I entirely agree with your sentiments about the inaptly named "Customer Car" folk at VW Australia. In the 21st century I would have thought that getting a model specific tow bar on the market wouldn't have been all that difficult - it ain't rocket science!

Your understandable annoyance at VW Australia's deplorable lack-of-action notwithstanding, the extended delay does raise an interesting question; If you have tolerated not having a tow-bar for this long period of time, do you really need one?

In my case, I went for the Hayman Reece tow bar in desperation, but this doesn't appear to be the case for you.

HI DV52. The operative word is "tolerated" - I've been able to work around a number of things I'd be using the towbar for:
- bike fits in the back of the car with the seats down, but not a great solution as the commuter bike has hydraulic disc brakes and I need to remove the front wheel. There will come a day when the brake lever is bumped and I can't just slot the wheel back in.
- rubbish bins are being walked out to the road, rather than towed (200m down/up a significant 30% slope hill)
- fire fuel reduction on my property done by burning the prunings, rather than towing to the tip

The show stopper for me is that I want a Hobie catamaran for next season, and I don't have a work around for that. Dealer manager I spoke to last week said he doesn't see a big demand for towbars for the Golf. I suspect in relative terms he's right, but I don't need to tow a heavy load, just a big one.

Good to know there are now alternatives. However, while I'm trying to get VW to come to the party over other issues, I'm leaving this outstanding. They have agreed to install the LED plate lights (I have bi-xenons), but the best they have offered on Voice Assist is a free install. Next step is to talk to Vic consumer affairs, and then I'm thinking about VCAT.

[lambertia]

phil38555615: I purchased a Golf Mk7 Highline in June 2013 and the same problem arose then (i.e. no tow bar). After many months of waiting I eventually negotiated with my Dealer to fit a Hayman Reece towbar instead . The tow bar was fitted in October 2013 . It was designed for a Golf Mk6 and it fitted OK (both mechanically and electrically).

Hi Phil,

Did the dealer use the genuine loom or did he use the electrics that came with the HR?

Cheers,
--
Greg.

[DV52]

Hi Phil,

Did the dealer use the genuine loom or did he use the electrics that came with the HR?

Cheers,
--
Greg.

Greg: My understanding is that the Hayman Reece towbar was installed with its own "black box" and loom. As I have said in a previous post, I have connected the tow bar to a trailer with standard incandescent lamps and I have also connected it to a bike rack with LED lamps. I've never had the bulb failure indicator appear on the MFD with either item attached to the towbar.

I've also checked the status of the "trailer" function on my car using a VCDS cable. As you can see in the picture below, and notwithstanding that I don't get a bulb failure indicator on the MFD, the "trailer installed" entry (i.e. bit 4 of byte 5 in the "engine" controller) is NOT ticked on my car. Yet the trailer electrics works wonderfully!

[lambertia]

Greg: My understanding is that the Hayman Reece towbar was installed with its own "black box" and loom. As I have said in a previous post, I have connected the tow bar to a trailer with standard incandescent lamps and I have also connected it to a bike rack with LED lamps. I've never had the bulb failure indicator appear on the MFD with either item attached to the towbar.

I've also checked the status of the "trailer" function on my car using a VCDS cable. As you can see in the picture below, and notwithstanding that I don't get a bulb failure indicator on the MFD, the "trailer installed" entry (i.e. bit 4 of byte 5 in the "engine" controller) is NOT ticked on my car. Yet the trailer electrics works wonderfully!

[ATTACH=CONFIG]8896[/ATTACH]

Thanks that makes me more comfortable to go down the HR path. I note that your car is not right hand drive

Cheers,
--
Greg.

[DV52]

Thanks that makes me more comfortable to go down the HR path. I note that your car is not right hand drive

Cheers,
--
Greg.

Greg: Very astute observation -that might explain why I have to keep getting into the passenger side to drive the car!

Seriously, whilst I consider myself to be somewhat of a "newby" where ODB2 protocols are concerned, my deeply held suspicion is that there is a hierachy of "tick" marks in the structure of the Golf's software. There are many folk on here that know a lot more about this stuff than do I, so it's entirely possible that I'm incorrect in my thinking.

Anyhow, in respect of your observation, I suspect that the entry for RH drive in the engine controller (my previous pic) is subserviant to the over-riding entry in the "Central Electronics controller". I've inclosed below a copy of the entry for the first byte of the "Elect.Cont" which clearly indicates where my steering wheel should be.
.
.



I had a look at the towbar on Kevin_67 's post. It looks interesting in that it appears to have a detachable tongue (wouldn't it be great if we all had one of these?). A detachable tongue seems to be a good idea because there is no risk of inadvertantly knocking your leg on the tow bar. However, I'm not sure if the tongue will rattle when it is attached. The good thing about the HR towbar is that everything is screwed together, so no rattles. But it's easy to knock your leg into the tongue if you're not careful. The other great thing about the HR towbar (for me at least) is that it is a "standard" fitting tongue which meant that the modifications that I made to fit my bike rack were quite simple. But I acknowledge that these issues might not be so important to others.

[lambertia]

I'm having the HR towbar fitted as we speak. Need to tow a toilet this weekend!

[DV52]

I'm having the HR towbar fitted as we speak. Need to tow a toilet this weekend!

Lambertia: Let us know how it goes. As I said before, mine has worked OK for almost 12 months now.

PS: Please don't take this the wrong way, but there are probably better ways of dealing with the "call of the wild" (i.e. the occassional need to go to the toilet) than towing a tiolet around on the back of the car!!!! (only kidding)

[TDIjeff]

The HR bar is only rated at 1250kg. The TDI is good for 1600. I have asked HR if they are going to do a higher rated bar for the 7.
When I asked about the HR ecu they said its a dumb unit but does disable the reversing alarm and rear fog lights if fitted.
I would prefer to go HR bar with VW loom.

[lambertia]

Lambertia: Let us know how it goes. As I said before, mine has worked OK for almost 12 months now.

PS: Please don't take this the wrong way, but there are probably better ways of dealing with the "call of the wild" (i.e. the occassional need to go to the toilet) than towing a tiolet around on the back of the car!!!! (only kidding)

It didn't go very well at all

It seems that the HR bar advertised as fitting the MK7 wagon does not fit it. The installer realised this after taking things off the car and called HR for confirmation. They had just realised this themselves and expect to have a tow bar ready for the Wagon in a couple of months. I guess they got caught napping a bit as I think the previous wagon was based on the MK5?

The installer was very apologetic. It's not his fault he did everything right.

A bit disappointed as I needed it this weekend. I'll need to hire a ute instead.

Cheers!

[TDIjeff]

When I was looking at a 2014 A3 HR said they did not have a bar for it and offered a free bar and fitting if I let them have the car for two lots of two days.
If they didn't offer you the same deal then they must have already started a design.

[DV52]

It didn't go very well at all

It seems that the HR bar advertised as fitting the MK7 wagon does not fit it.
A bit disappointed as I needed it this weekend. I'll need to hire a ute instead.

Cheers!

Lambertia: Sorry to hear about the mix-up. In my case the mk6 Golf towbar fitted nicely to the mk7 Golf- without any problem.

The HR bar is only rated at 1250kg. The TDI is good for 1400. I have asked HR if they are going to do a higher rated bar for the 7.

TDIJeff: I agree that the bigger rating is probably better, but the real question is :how much load would you be prepared to tow on a mkVII (any model)? I'm not sure that I would ever consider putting anything close to 1250Kgs on the back of my Golf. I suspect that the more important issue for those of us that have a tow-bar on a mk7 series VW (be it Golf, or Wagon) is the volumetric size of the trailer (rather than actual Kgs). But I acknowledge that other mk7 owners may have different needs.

[lambertia]

When I was looking at a 2014 A3 HR said they did not have a bar for it and offered a free bar and fitting if I let them have the car for two lots of two days.
If they didn't offer you the same deal then they must have already started a design.

Yes I think they have started. I didn't interact directly with HR. Maybe I should send them a message and offer them my car! I'll catch the bus for a couple of days!

[bru20vt]

Here is another option - WESTFALIA now have a presence in Aust. Looks like the A40V model has a no/minimal cut which from what I can gather is not visible.

Westfalia Automotive Australia Pty Ltd