G4 Owners Club

G4 Discovery 2 NAS Towbar

https://forum.g4ownersclub.com/Topic12468.aspx

By TC - 30 May 2009

Hi G4'ers



I've taken the liberty of joining your forum to ask a technical question.



I want to fit a NAS tow hitch to my (sadly) not G4 Discovery 2. On reading the rules any towbar fitted to a car manufactured after 1998 has to be Type Approved (TA) and stamped with the approval etc. My dealer has the part in but I won't buy as it doesn't have the TA on it.



This makes it 1) illegal to have on the vehicle 2) I'm told this will form part of future MOT's so will fail if fitted.



I have been told all G4 D2's had these hitches fitted. When LR sold these off then technically, unless the hitch has TA then they were selling a defective vehicle, and owners may fail MOT's or have problems if their insurer found out etc etc.



Does anyone know if the NAS bar is Type Approved or have LR contacts to find out? I'd love to fit the NAS hitch but if I fell foul of this ruling I'd lose my job as well as the car related issues!



The best bit, in true EC style, is that it is perfectly legal to fit this hitch to a D2 Commercial but not a normal D2 - vans/commercials/crewcabs etc are specfically excluded. Same vehicle, different rules!:exclamation:



Thanks in advance. I only wish I had the £40k to buy one of the G4 D3's dealers have been selling recently.



Tony
By AntV8 - 30 May 2009

I was reading this on the LRO forums last night! I hope this does not effect mine or any of the G4 D2's. Looks like another crazy EU ruling!! Why is it an issue when pretty much every 4x4 or pickup in the US uses them! Have to look into this!

Ant

By TC - 30 May 2009

that was me on the LRO forum!



makes no sense whatsoever but if LR fitted the G4 vehicles with them and then sold then post 98 them LR are at fault, so I guess you guys might have a claim.



I am hoping, although getting any sort of answer is proving difficult, that they are type approved but LR have not bothered to put this on the bar at manufacture since they are primarily US items. Then all that is required is a sticker!



Tony
By TC - 30 May 2009

Ant88 (5/30/2009)
I was reading this on the LRO forums last night! I hope this does not effect mine or any of the G4 D2's. Looks like another crazy EU ruling!! Why is it an issue when pretty much every 4x4 or pickup in the US uses them! Have to look into this!



Ant


I was hoping you guys might have a contact at LR who could sort it out. If you bought from a main dealer then you could have fun taking the car back and asking what they are going to do about it!:P
By camel_landy - 31 May 2009

TC (5/30/2009)
makes no sense whatsoever but if LR fitted the G4 vehicles with them and then sold then post 98 them LR are at fault, so I guess you guys might have a claim.




Not quite...



LR stripped all D2s of their kit prior to selling into the EU market, the cars were then put through an SVA test prior to release. This was all done because of the type approval issue.



(Note: I'm deliberately mentioning EU market as IIRC there were some supplied with the kit but they were intended for non-EU markets.)



M
By roymck - 1 Jun 2009

Yes i was on the LRO forum suggesting you fit a sticker from emarked Disco towbar to it to make it legal .

However i have had more thoughts on it . The North American style hitch has never really been used on any Uk car as far as i am aware . If this tow bar is fitted and it does not have a tow hitch on it and its only there to bolt the mantec fuel tank guard to, then as far as i am concerned its not a tow bar , it is being utilised for another purpose. It does not have a lable to say its a tow bar and if used as it was designed for on a G4 then its a recovery point . As far as i am concerned it will only become illegal if you fit the reciever hitch with ball to it, then it becomes a tow bar .

If you bolt a recovery point onto your D2 chassis it does not become a Tow Bar , so keep the recovery eye on your NAS tow bar and its a legal recovery point .

Any views or am i talking rubbish?

By CraigS-L - 2 Jun 2009

PM Erasmus, we went through this saga on the DOC forum a couple of years ago - IIRC it is not legal in the EU as a towbar/hitch unless you get it specifically SVA'd, however it is fine as a recovery point
By TC - 2 Jun 2009

Craig & Roy



That makes a lot of sense, thanks.



Would you know if getting it SVA'd as a towbar a nightmare or can it be (relatively!) painless.



Any ideas where I might get a Mantec tank guard as they don't do them anymore?



Ta.



Tony