Nothing's stopping the Disco

Land Rover's Discovery with its new D350 engine not only tows like a beast - it boasts towing features most rigs can only dream of.

- Leon Botha

We all knew that kid in school. The one who excelled at everything: top of the class; full colours in rugby, cricket and debate; crystal-clear baritone in the choir; every school athletics record under his name; and the lead in the school play. Good-looking and charming, friends with everyone, and his dad just happens to be the wealthiest farmer in the district. In the world of towing vehicles, that kid is the Land Rover Discovery.

We tested the Discovery HSE S16 Luxury seven years ago and were already impressed back then by its attention to towing tech. The latest Discovery has seriously levelled up - just look at the torque: it's jumped from 450 Nm to a whopping 700 Nm. (For comparison, the 3 l petrol engine back then offered 450 Nm, and the diesel version 600 Nm. - Ed).

There's a lot you could say about the Discovery, but since we're campers, our focus is on how it handles towing. So, we hitched up a Mobi Lodge Quattro and headed for the hills.

Get hitched

Our test vehicle comes with an electric towbar that folds out neatly from behind the bumper. It's a Brink setup with a vertical load limit of 350 kg. Land Rover allows a nose weight of up to 150 kg, and this particular towbar has a D-value of 16,56 kN (which translates to 1 688,65 kg).

The control buttons for the towbar are in a panel in the load area. The lower right button swings the bar out, and there's a 13-pin socket in the bar's shaft for your standard caravan plug adaptor. (You can also deploy the bar from the driver's seat by pressing a button on the infotainment screen — just remember to remove the adaptor before stowing the towbar again.)