Chris replied:

G'day Pete,
Don't get too worked up about it. I sold my 98 V6 Jackaroo last year with 300 and a bit km's that towed a camper for about a third of that. Any good well balanced caravan/camper /trailer of the size your talking will only have about 80-100 kg down on the ball. I had the oppertunity to weigh my latest camper and at full load including 130lt of water in front of the tray weighed 1.2T with a ball weight of 90 kg.
The Jack is a very tough wagon and manufactures publish conservitive figures. Don't get too worked up about it.
Regards,
Chris.

Member - Jeffrey replied:

Hi Peter Z,
Like the other member said dont panick,when loading your camper put more weight towards the rear of the camper you will work it out ,a lot of the time it's in how you load your trailer.
All The Best In Health And Wealth
Jeffrey (AKA JD )

The Banjo replied:

Pete......
Have been through this issue and out the other side a few times re my 99 Jack......if you get onto Holden they will simply send you the latest handbook pages (2003 model +) with slightly different wording from your manual. You can go a much a higher ballweight in reality, but the main issue is if you have a serious incident, what will the insurer do ? So.....
I took advice from a caravan industry expert who does training for CV users and consults with insurers too. He says that the jack can wear more like 250 on the ball, and that Reese just follow the handbook when they badge their bars. It is fair to say that Holden/Isuzu have not tested their vehicle for this issue and just "stab" at a figure.....as you say 100kg should be the specs for a Lada or some other upholstered roller-skate. I'm buying a new camper and ball weight was an issue in the choice.......Campomatic means I can just hook it up and roll away....Kimberley meant I had to get into weight distribution hitches (which have to be disconnected when in the rough stuff - and they cost!). In summary....as I see it.....just my view (I'm no engineer) .......you can actually have a higher ball weight than specced, but you still have do something about levelling of the car. My expert suggested that the Jack will take a whole lot more than 100, you will need a WD hitch to keep things level when you do get up on ball weights and the insurer will be ok re claims if you establish sensible engineering on your part (loading limits, WD hitch, driving to conditions etc). Keep in mind that the WD hitch does not reduce ball load - just shifts some of that ball load to the front - poly bags in the rear springs will help to adjust a bit of bum sag but they stiffen the suspension and can lead to breakages if overloaded. With my current planning, when the Campo arrives I might get up to around 140 on the ball at worst. I call that sensible and practical.......Cheers.....

Member - Bradley replied:

Hmm picking the brain here, but i'm sure when i was at holden i fitted a bar to a jack that had a 2500 / 250 load plate on it. I remember because my 98 only has 2500/100 stamped on it. They can handle a lot more than 100 , you might have to run higher rate springs or air bags to keep the ride level, but 130 should be a piece of cake..
PS if you want a set of polyairs then get on to truckspring.com about $150 aus , delivered to your door. Better than $350 or more locally.

Welcome to isuzu heaven.......

geoff replied:

Hi Pete talk to holden again I have a 2001 and the wording is misleading so I e-mailed holden and they told me 250kg.

Regards Geoff

Willie replied:

Hi Pete

Like others I have been through this matter of tow ball load in great detail and I am now satisfied that my setup both works well and is quite legal. I have a 2000 SE Jack with a 3.5 petrol manual and I tow a Jayco tandem van which has an all up weight of about 2200 - 2300 kgs. I have been towing this rig for over 3 years with no problems. The tow ball load is 230kgs and I use a Hayman Reece 250 kg load equalising hitch.

With respect to the towball download specifications, I contacted Holden in 2001 about the recommended 100kg maximum download and obtained a letter from their customer assistance section which..." recomended that tow bar ball weight should be 10% of the loaded trailer weight and further stated that.... a load equalising hitch is essential when the total trailer tow bar weight exceeds 100kg (total trailer weight 1000kg)". As the Jack recommended towing capacity is 2500 kg. I believe that this revised recommendation provides for a maximum tow ball weight of up to 250kg...provided that an appropriate load equalising system is used where ball weight exceeds 100kg.

With respect to the Hayman Reece set up, my hitch is also stamped maximum towing capacity 2500kgs and maximum tow ball weight of 120 kgs. However, the hitch also has a label attached which states..."to increase the Hitch Receiver's permissable static ball load from the capacity stated on the compliance plate to the stated vehicle manufacturers capacity use the appropriate Weight Distributing Hitch system". I believe that Holden's revised recommendations for my vehicle and the label on the Hayman Reece Hitch mean that my rig is within both manufacturers recommendations.

I hope that this helps.

Willie

The Banjo replied:

Aint it great........Holden....Isuzu........I like the Jack ....its great, but all of the above leads to the conclusion in my mind that on this issue (and probably a few more we don't know about) neither the manufacturer nor the marketer have done a damned thing about establishing engineered figures for this.....its all bluff.....typical case of we customers knowing a whole lot more than they do. The 10% of towed mass etc is parroting of guidelines that have been here for years - we could have told them that. Anyway, with stuff all help from them, we small group of owners are on top of it. Onya Pete.