Tow pole

I bought one for about £6 in a French Aldi store last year. Didn't really have a need but it was cheap-made in PRC. Since then I have actually used it to tow broken down cars of nieces and nephews' a few times. The first due to a break in and dashboard shattered in an attempt to remove the radio. Others due to worn out clutch and various other problems. The bar is in four sections of hollow square tube which telescope into each other. The inners have spring loaded buttons which lock into holes in the outer sections. Similar idea to tent pole fixings. At each end there is a hook which fits the towing eye of the towing and towed vehicle. I don't feel that the spring loaded buttons are the best idea, and if one gave way the bar would come apart which could cause some damage to the front of the towed vehicle. I might replace them with bolts or big clevis pins if I can find any big enough. Having said that, it works very well and is a huge improvement on a tow rope (especially with a novice-my brother in law is crap at towing and being towed). You can hear that there is a little movement created by the looseness of the fit of the hook at each end which could be overcome if there was a something like a rubber block to take up the slack. If there was a spring fitted to the centre section it would be a bonus. DaveK.

The message from "davek" contains these words:

Mine's got big clevis pins with a flip-over retaining bail. There's a center section with tubes that slot in each end. They don't telescope terribly well, but it seems very solid.

There's a version of mine with a spring in the middle - but I can't say I'd bother buying one. I couldn't feel much knocking, partly because one end of mine's a snug fitting towball coupling.

I've considered one of these over this winter. It seems to have been the=20 winter where all of the folk at work decided to leave their lights on=20 and no-one seems to own a set of jump leads.=20

My own set were borrowed at the beginning of the winter and I haven't=20 seen them since so I'm not replacing them.=20

The silliest attempt a bump starting we did was a Jag.. Automatic. Now=20 I've tow started one of these before, but the driver of this one didn't=20 engender me with a sense of trust, so there was no way I was going to=20 let them rear end me for the sake of a break down call out fee. I might=20 be more inclined to do it if I had a nice solid bar though.

Warwick

The message from Warwick contains these words:

Most autos don't have a pump on the output shaft of the gearbox, so can't raise oil pressure to make the gearbox do anything so can't turn the engine no matter how fast you tow them.