Tool cluster · INT.04 Drive · 3 native tools
Tow & Load
Can the car tow it, how heavy should the nose be, and how much is left for the family and the luggage? Three tools that work from the plate, not from a model database, with the rules dated and sourced.
Plate figures in, verdicts out
Tow Match
Outfit ratio, towing limit, train weight, noseweight, licence and speed for six countries, one screen.
Noseweight & Rack Load
The 5–7 % window for the caravan, and how many bikes the towball can carry.
Payload Remaining
MAM minus kerb, people, luggage, roof box and noseweight, with the 75 kg driver made explicit.
Towing is the largest everyday driving job that nobody instruments. The rules are real, the fines are real, and the information is scattered across a VIN plate, a caravan handbook, a licence photocard and three government websites in three languages. Most people resolve it by asking a forum, where the answer is usually "you'll be fine" from someone who has never seen the car.
The problem these tools solve
Every towing question is five limits and two guidelines. The limits come from the car's manufacturer: how much it may tow braked, how much it may weigh itself, how much the whole train may weigh, and how much the towball may carry. The guidelines come from the towing bodies and from physics: keep the trailer at or under 85 % of the kerb weight if you are new to it, and load 5–7 % of the trailer's weight onto the nose so it follows instead of leading. Then the licence law says which combinations your category allows, and the traffic code says how fast you may go with a trailer behind you. Nothing about this is hard. It is only scattered.
The incumbent calculators want a car database. That makes them wrong the moment a car is fitted with a tow pack, a different tyre size, a heavier engine or an LPG tank, and useless for vans, motorhomes and anything older than the database. These three tools ask for the plate figures instead. The plate is the legal document; if the tool and the plate disagree, the plate wins, and the tool says so on every page.
The shared method
Each tool separates the two kinds of number. A plated limit that is exceeded reads OVER; a guideline that is missed reads WARN; a rule that needs a figure you have not entered reads INFO and tells you where to find it. The licence and speed rows in Tow Match come from a dated table, re-read from the official pages this month, each row carrying its source. The noseweight window and the payload subtraction are arithmetic on your inputs and carry no data at all, so they cannot go stale. Mass in running order includes a 75 kg driver by EU convention; kerb weight usually does not; every tool that touches the difference asks which one you have.
State lives in the link. Fill a tool in, copy the address, and the person at the other end sees the same outfit with the same verdicts, with nothing stored anywhere but the URL.
The Drive journey
Where "tow it legally" sits among route, money and seat: the INT.04 order of operations.
driveweekend
Once the outfit is legal, the weekend needs a route, stops and a packing list. One shareable link.
FAQ
Five numbers, all on the VIN plate, the V5C or the certificate of conformity: kerb weight or mass in running order, gross vehicle weight (MAM), maximum braked towing mass, maximum noseweight and gross train weight. From the trailer: its MTPLM and, with a gauge, the actual noseweight. No model database is involved.
Heavier helps the ratio, but the plate decides. A heavy SUV with a low plated towing mass or a small gross train weight can be less capable on paper than a lighter estate with generous limits. Tow Match checks all of them at once so the weakest limit is the one you see.
Each country sets its own limit for combinations: 60 mph on UK motorways and dual carriageways, 80 km/h outside built-up areas in Germany, 90 km/h on Dutch and Lithuanian motorways, car limits in France until the rated combination passes 3.5 tonnes, state law in the US. Tow Match prints the rule for the country you select with the official page it came from.