2002 Honda Civic Towing with my car?

VICKYHARE

MEMBER
2002 HONDA CIVIC

2002 Honda Civic 4 cyl Manual 120000 miles

Hi there,
I have a tent trailer that I would like to tow with my car. Now, on the side of the door it has the towing capasity and the tent trailer is way less(by 2X). But I am being told not to tow with it, well why would they say that the car towing capasity is if you can't tow wiith it.I have also been told to put in a transmition cooler? We did take it camping 2 times and it drives just like normal. Then I was told by someone not to put it in overdrive? I really want to know if its safe to tow. We had to have the transmition rebuilt so we don't want to have to do that again.
Thanks,
Vicky

2 Replies

KHLOW2008

MECHANIC
41,814 POSTS

Hi Vicky,

Is your vehicle a manual or automatic transmission?

Towing is not a problem if the load is within the speified range but you must understand that when excessive stress is put on the transmisison and engine for prolonged periods, it is not going to be good for them.

Driving habit and road conditions plays an important part in this.

You can use overdrive on level grounds but when going up long stretches of slopes, D3 would be a better choice to prevent up and down shifting too often.