Anyone towing with an Audi Q7 3.0

[EricLsv]

19 hours ago, gregtay said:

Does your Q8 have the air susp? (Prestige trim)   I highly recommend getting the Audi hitch mount as it is ideal (properly rated, and very short.)  Audi requires that you use a very short ball mount.  I know for my Q7 w/ air suspension I had it flipped over (raise instead of drop) but I could always raise or lower the car as needed to get the boat level.  My wife now has an SQ8 Prestige (so with the air susp) and I will also use the ball mount inverted on that car as well.

yes i got that trim, its a great car the air suspension is fun to play with- i will order an audi hitch mount. thank you

 

whjen i search audi website this is what i get

https://parts.audiusa.com/p/Audi_2021_Q8/CURT-Ball-Mount/73268507/ZAW092730B.html

 

is this correct?

 

 

Edited March 20, 2021 by EricLsv

[jjackkrash]

1 hour ago, EricLsv said:

yes i got that trim, its a great car the air suspension is fun to play with- i will order an audi hitch mount. thank you

 

whjen i search audi website this is what i get

https://parts.audiusa.com/p/Audi_2021_Q8/CURT-Ball-Mount/73268507/ZAW092730B.html

 

is this correct?

 

 

Call e-trailer and see if you can get something adjustable that works.  You will want to be able to level the trailer (even if the rig has air suspension you want both as level as possible).  If you can get a weigh-safe that works, even better (so you always know the tongue weight).  We use one for the wife's ML400 and it works great (and they now make a black cerakote model that looks t*ts with a black car):

https://www.etrailer.com/Trailer-Hitch-Ball-Mount/Weigh-Safe/WS4-25.html?feed=npn&gclid=EAIaIQobChMItpOnwuC97wIVoj6tBh3Q2QbjEAQYAyABEgIxIvD_BwE

 

 

 

 

Edited March 20, 2021 by jjackkrash

[gregtay]

14 hours ago, EricLsv said:

yes i got that trim, its a great car the air suspension is fun to play with- i will order an audi hitch mount. thank you

 

whjen i search audi website this is what i get

https://parts.audiusa.com/p/Audi_2021_Q8/CURT-Ball-Mount/73268507/ZAW092730B.html

 

is this correct?

 

 

Yes, that is the one.  It is not cheap... but you will understand why then you pick it up.  It is solid metal (not hollow like many ball mounts out there.) 

[gregtay]

12 hours ago, jjackkrash said:

Call e-trailer and see if you can get something adjustable that works.  You will want to be able to level the trailer (even if the rig has air suspension you want both as level as possible).  If you can get a weigh-safe that works, even better (so you always know the tongue weight).  We use one for the wife's ML400 and it works great (and they now make a black cerakote model that looks t*ts with a black car):

https://www.etrailer.com/Trailer-Hitch-Ball-Mount/Weigh-Safe/WS4-25.html?feed=npn&gclid=EAIaIQobChMItpOnwuC97wIVoj6tBh3Q2QbjEAQYAyABEgIxIvD_BwE

 

 

 

 

He can try this, but I can't stress enough the need to keep the ball mount very short.  Most of the adjustable ones are long and increase the distance of the ball from the back axle.  I have towed boats countless miles with my Touareg and Q7 and these cars are just really like the ball as close to the rear axle as possible.  So much so... Audi even has a statement about it in the owners manual.  I tried some other ball mounts (adjustable ones, etc) that were longer and you could tell the difference, so I went back to the factory one.  The Touareg (shorter wheelbase) towed better than the Q7 (both had the same air suspension system) and I think it was simply due to the ball mount being so much closer to the rear axle on the Touareg.  The Q7 has a longer wheelbase but a much longer rear overhang (otherwise they are the same car.)  The nice thing about the Q8 is that it is nearly the length of the Q7 (2 inches shorter) but they pushed the rear axle back, so you have a longer wheelbase and a shorter distance from the rear axle to the ball mount.  Add the four wheel steering, air suspension to fully level the load, all the towing wizardry on these cars and it should be a fantastic tow rig.  (sadly the USA Q8s don't have the full towing assist package enabled in the software, no idea why. Someone did figure out how to enable it via VAGCOM but it was a 20 step process and I figured it wasn't really worth it.)

[jjackkrash]

5 minutes ago, gregtay said:

He can try this, but I can't stress enough the need to keep the ball mount very short.  Most of the adjustable ones are long and increase the distance of the ball from the back axle.  

This is always solid advise; the closer to the axle the better.  Getting the trailer level is also important, though.  The weigh-safe base is about a 1/4 inch from my wife's ML 400 bumper using the inner hole on the stem and it works great.  But 100% agree with you if the Audi specific model is the only one that meets specs then that is the one that should be used.  The e-trailer guys are usually pretty good and should be able to answer this question and let him know if there are any options that work. 

[natethelen]

As an update to my earlier post, turns out the 2014 Q7 does 6600 lbs if you have the factory tow package (which I do) and 5500 if you do it later.  So I think I am closer to my boat's actual weight.  I have now towed it around town to/from storage and service center and it was fine.  Very level without the air suspension.  I do want to take the boat to a weigh station just to know, but I haven't gotten to a point where I have gone above 45-50 nor up/down a boat ramp.  Will update

[oldjeep]

1 hour ago, natethelen said:

As an update to my earlier post, turns out the 2014 Q7 does 6600 lbs if you have the factory tow package (which I do) and 5500 if you do it later.  So I think I am closer to my boat's actual weight.  I have now towed it around town to/from storage and service center and it was fine.  Very level without the air suspension.  I do want to take the boat to a weigh station just to know, but I haven't gotten to a point where I have gone above 45-50 nor up/down a boat ramp.  Will update

Your boat is around 7200 on the trailer

 

[natethelen]

On 3/30/2021 at 3:59 PM, oldjeep said:

Your boat is around 7200 on the trailer

Wow, very close!  Yep, just weighed it and with a completely empty boat and the gas tank at about 70%, the scales said 7260.

It did raise a couple questions, though.  The tongue weight was only 580.  With where the storage is on the boat (mostly over the trailer wheels), I don't see that even if I added the anchor and some other gear making much of a tongue weight difference.  So:

1. I thought it was bad to get too far off from a 10% tongue weight, but it seems that most people are towing around Malibu's where that isn't the case.  Where is the limit where it starts to get dangerous
2. I am not worried about driving my boat around town and even putting it in/out of the water with my 400+ lb/ft of torque, but as long as I am under the tongue weight of 660 lbs that my car can handle, the brake sizes are the same to the year newer (that can tow 7700 lbs), and an engine with more torquey than the 7700 lbs tower a year newer, how much do I need to worry about towing 150 miles or so?

[oldjeep]

10% tongue weight is for single axle trailers, you can get away with 5-7% on multi axle trailers as long as you have your hitch setup relatively level.

 

I personally wouldn't toy that kind of weight with a small engine unibody SUV, but plenty of people do

[jjackkrash]

oldjeep is a knowledgable poster, but I have to disagree on the axles making that much difference on the percentage.  10% is recommended by all the trailer guys I have talked to for 1, 2, or 3 axles.  I'd much rather have 10-12% over 7%, and 5% is really pushing it, IMO.   There's no way I'd want to haul my mini-ex down the road on the tandem axle flatbed with only 5% or 7%.  I try and hit 12% when I am loading it (based on the weigh safe measurements).  

Also, my dad works for a big boat dealership and tows all sizes of boats often, and after a few bad experiences with improperly set up trailers, he refuses to hook up a big boat to his truck with only 5% on the tongue, even with trip axles.

The problem with light tongue weight is the wig wags, which can show up, for example, on downhill curves or when one of the tires slides off the shoulder and hits gravel or soft dirt on narrow roads.   The trailer with a light tongue might tow fine during normal conditions, but the wig wags can rear their ugly head when you least want them to, i.e., emergency conditions.  

[oldjeep]

For whatever reason, tongue weight recommendations are typically split by boat trailers and not boat trailers.

Boat trailers you almost always see 5-10% as the recommendation.   I personally have no issue towing with around 5-7% and you will find that most boat trailers (malibu included) are set up in that range from the factory.

 

Edited May 6, 2021 by oldjeep

[justgary]

I would expect to see a difference in tongue weight recommendations between equalized and torsion tandem axle trailers.  Torsion axles behave completely differently, and proper tongue height is much more critical than it is on an equalized tandem.