I'm new to the world of trailering vehicles. My car is an '87 BMW e30 and I'm getting ready to trailer it for the first time. There doesn't seem to be a lot of great locations on the car for attaching the tie-down straps. Also, the front valence is quite low, making it tough to get a strap underneath to something substantial. I thought it might be a good idea to loop the straps through the wheels, but then did a little searching and some internet dude swears this can pull the car's alignment out of wack.
What do you guys think? Is using the wheels an acceptable spot for tie-downs when trailering?
If you do it wrong you could easily put more force on the wheels then they would normally see. I suppose this could result in an alignment issue. I've never been comfortable with strapping a car down by its wheels. I use heavy chassis members, inner suspension mounts, factory tie downs/tow hooks (if substantial), clevis pins through rigid parts and then strap the car down compressing the suspension so the vehicle doesn't move much relative to the trailer. Its worked so far for me.
Am e 30 has a shipping hook eyelet on the body behind the rear part of the passenger front wheel and 1 to either side of the car behind the rearward part of the back wheels. It also has large hooks on both sides beneath the front bumper and one on the passenger side under the rear bumper.there may be more but those are the ones I use.
i think there are holes under the front jacking points and you can use these:
e36s have them front and back but maybe e30s only have front.
I generally like to strap the car down rather than the wheels so that the car is a bit more secure on the trailer and the car's suspension is not bouncing separately from the trailer's. Don't know about alignment though.
My race car, I use the factory points on the rear and through the wheels in the front.
Our race team, we go through wheels only.
you're overthinking this:
I've tied my cars down via the wheels. There are special wheel tie down systems, which goes around both sides of each well.
I used to use the suspension, but got tired of getting on my back to tie the car down.
Basically this.
That way the tire rubber acts as some buffer between the straps and the suspension. Not that I was concerned about that.
If you have center locks, you can use these:
I do not have centerlocks. However, it seems strapping to that would cause the same stresses as looping through the entire wheel would (if not, more).
I'd actually like to just go through the wheel for simplicity and not having to climb all the way under the car. Am I in danger of messing up the alignment if I do?
I don't like compressing the suspension on vehicles when tying down, you'll have to snug it down until it's bottomed out and can't move, or you risk things working loose as you drive over bumps and the suspension compresses/rebounds. I latch to unsprung parts, i.e. wheels, control arms, axles. Most of my towed vehicles have been Jeeps, so it's easy to strap a tie down around the axles.
When dealing with cars, I've gone through A-arms, wheels, etc. I've never been worried about messing up the alignment, I'm not doing any worse with a tow strap than hitting a pot hole or curb would.
I've told myself if I make a habit of dragging home "project" cars more often, I'm going to get a set of over the wheel/tire tie downs like alfadriver has pictured above.
bigdaddylee82 wrote:
I don't like compressing the suspension on vehicles when tying down, you'll have to snug it down until it's bottomed out and can't move, or you risk things working loose as you drive over bumps and the suspension compresses/rebounds.
What he said. I go through the wheels every time. An alignment is a lot cheaper than a car getting loose from bouncing out of it's straps.
Thanks for the input everyone. The opinions seem pretty evenly split. I think I'll go through the wheels and not overly-tighten the straps. I see a lot of people who cross the straps side-to-side. Any thoughts on the necessity of this?
I cross them.
In our race hauler, we don't cross them, but have e-track right at wheel width.
I'd also add, when we ship the cars via sea container, we also go through the wheels.
Another vote for going through the wheels not being an issue. I do it all the time on my Miata, it's fine.
I run the front straps straight, the rear ones crossed. This is mainly because my trailer isn't quite long enough to run both sets of straps straight.
I can't quite figure out what's going on with the BMW. Did he hook the strap over the A-arm and then loop it through the wheel or something? Those straps look awfully narrow as well.
codrus wrote:
I can't quite figure out what's going on with the BMW. Did he hook the strap over the A-arm and then loop it through the wheel or something? Those straps look awfully narrow as well.
Straps are too waaaaay too small, they may even be friction lock and not ratchet straps, and he's hooked the ends into the spokes on the wheels themselves instead of going back to where the other end is hooked.
Would not want to be anywhere near that setup.
nah those are harbor freight ratchets.
i'd get in front of them as quickly as possibly and stay ahead. and probably call the cops.
Running straps through the wheels is OK if done correctly. The point you go through the wheel has to be at a point closest to the tie down point that strap goes to. If you loop the strap up high or low and forward you can have the strap loosen because the wheel can spin and release the tension on the strap.
However you tie it down, still include a safety chain from the front of the trailer to one of the front tow points.
EDIT AND a chain from one of the rear tow points to the rear of the trailer.
itsarebuild wrote:
Am e 30 has a shipping hook eyelet on the body behind the rear part of the passenger front wheel and 1 to either side of the car behind the rearward part of the back wheels. It also has large hooks on both sides beneath the front bumper and one on the passenger side under the rear bumper.there may be more but those are the ones I use.
I'd never use that on either of ours. They're thinner than sheet metal on my rallycross car, and on the Chumpcar they hardly even exist at all thanks to rust. They were just for tying the car down on the ship over from Germany, and not meant to withstand higher g-forces that a car acceleration (or particularly deceleration) will incur on a trailer during a panic stop.
For front, use the factory tow hooks (if it's a diving board model). They're plenty strong and the real forces on the car are when braking, not when accelerating. On the rear, best place is to use axle straps around the subframe, or wheel straps (depending on what kind of wheels you have, if they have open spokes).
We've towed several e30s lots of places through lots of mountains and never had any tiedown issues whatsoever.
Also, it's easier if your rear tiedowns are more in-line with the car. Our trailer has them on the sides and clearance is an issue sometimes. Going to modify that soon...
but I've actually run a rallycross course at decent speed....with my car ON the trailer. It didn't go anywhere ;)
Kenny_McCormic wrote:
However you tie it down, still include a safety chain from the front of the trailer to one of the front tow points.
I've always put the chain on the rear. There aren't many forces pulling the car backwards. Not like you're doing drag starts. Two front straps plus the ebrake on and the car isn't going to fall off the back.
Chain on the back of the car to the back of the trailer. The biggest forces your car on the trailer is ever going to see is in a panic braking situation, which puts serious load on the rear straps. Years ago a guy towing a few cars up from me had to panic brake going down a hill for stopped traffic. The Chevelle on the trailer popped the two full-size rear straps and ended up smashed into the back of his tow rig. It was a complete mess.
Also if you're carrying the same car all the time, figure out where you like it parked (for best tongue weight) and then bolt some wheel chocks in front of the front wheels. A bit of extra security on the panic brake aspect.
One last thing: don't put the car in gear while on the trailer. Just use the ebrake. Putting it in gear can transfer a lot of small forces to the transmission....
t25torx wrote:
bigdaddylee82 wrote:
I don't like compressing the suspension on vehicles when tying down, you'll have to snug it down until it's bottomed out and can't move, or you risk things working loose as you drive over bumps and the suspension compresses/rebounds.
What he said. I go through the wheels every time. An alignment is a lot cheaper than a car getting loose from bouncing out of it's straps.
keep in mind that e30s with the common bottlecaps.....you're not going through the wheels, period ;)
In reply to irish44j:
Very good point, better yet, chain both ends.
t25torx wrote:
codrus wrote:
I can't quite figure out what's going on with the BMW. Did he hook the strap over the A-arm and then loop it through the wheel or something? Those straps look awfully narrow as well.
Straps are too waaaaay too small, they may even be friction lock and not ratchet straps, and he's hooked the ends into the spokes on the wheels themselves instead of going back to where the other end is hooked.
Would not want to be anywhere near that setup.
If those are friction type, it looks like they could both be released when the car bounces up on its suspension and the ends in the trunk are pulled up.
On my setup, the two front are chained and the chains are short. The ratchet straps in the back have to be longer 'cause they require a certain length just to be able to ratchet. I cross those.
I try to keep all straps as short as possible, capacity well in excess of weight of the vehicle and always use 4 (I've seen some folks use only one in front or back-- no redundancy). I've also been known to use my cordless drill to screw down a chock in front and back on long trips (enclosed trailer with wooden floor).
