I have a 3 litre 2013 Nissan Patrol auto, after pulling a car trailer at the weekend with a Toyota Workmate ute on it, it was very sad the performace. I bought the vehicle to tow a New Age 18 foot van, tare weight of 2 tonn. I think it might be a big mistake to go ahed and buy this van. Has anyone towed a van of that weight with a Patrol like mine? Appreciate any comments, good or bad
Did you check on the towing capacity before you purchased the Patrol? The manuals are rated to tow 3200 kg but the autos are only allowed 2500 kg.
What was the all up weight of the loaded trailer? Car trailers are fairly heavy on their own.
I had a friend who towed with one of your models. He got along OK but he is a fairly steady driver. You just have to be patient on hills but it will get you to your destination nearly as quickly as something that is capable of sprinting up hills. They are geared well for pulling hills. He used to get his rig. He did not have it long as the replacement van was actually too heavy for the Patrol, he replaced it with a Pathfinder that was rated to to the heavier van.
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PeterD Nissan Navara D23 diesel auto, Spaceland pop-top Retired radio and electronics technician. NSW Central Coast.
My first tug was a 2.8 litre Patrol, sold a 4.2 petrol Mavrick to buy it. Boy was I disappointed, wouldn't pull the skin off a rice custard!
At my very second camp spot, the guy next door must have seen me kicking the 2.8 and mumbling under my breath, asked me what I thought of it. After a rant he just smiled and said "I'll give you a tip, drive it like you just stole it, drive it hard."
I did just that and fell in love with it, have only just sold it with over 400,000kls on it, probably more than 30,000 with a 17 foot van on.
This might give you some insight to what its like.
I had a 3 ltr Nissan Navara ZD30 D22 Diesel. I had it for 10 years and did a lot of boat and caravan towing from Victoria to Cooktown and all over. This ute handled towing well and was quite economical but lacked torque. It only had to think there was a hill coming and it would start to slow down but once it was down a gear it would pull the van up the side of a cliff. I did some mods to it, I fiitted and intercooler, a catchcan and blocked off the EGR valve and all of this helped a lot bit did not cure the problem entirely. The car was reliable and I decided to live with it after all I was on holiday/retirement so what did it matter if I was a bit slower on hills than others. On the highway it performed well. Like a lot of other modern ute it was also too high geared in first gear which made it difficult to pull away from stop on a hill, my solution was leave the front hubs unlocked and use low first to move off then 2nd low then change to high range, this saved the clutch, it still had the original clutch and brake linings when I sold it at 200k.
