Anyone Tow Charge While Offroad?

[Dirtcom_AJ]

A lot of us have seen the Ben Sullins tow charge video on Youtube where he got 9 miles of range after tow charging for 3 miles on the highway. I am curious if anyone has actually tried this while offroading, and also with a midsize SUV/Truck gas vehicle. (instead of another 900 lb ft torque R1T as the pulling vehicle)

Why midsize SUV or Truck? Because that's most likely what you will find near you while offroading that isn't low on range. Anyway, I am tempted to do a video on this with the 4runner as the sacrificial puller just too see what happens. (research ?)

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[beatle]

I would not tow with a midsize truck or SUV since they typically top out around 5000 pounds. Not only is the R1T 2000 pounds more than that, but the additional resistance from the permanent magnet motors generating electricity will make the perceived load on the tow vehicle that much higher.

 

[docwhiz]

I've seen videos of Teslas being towed and gaining charge.
YMMV

 

[mudito]

I've seen videos of Teslas being towed and gaining charge.
YMMV

Jason from Engineering Explained did this with a Ford Raptor and a Tesla Model 3



It will answers a few fun questions

 

[Dirtcom_AJ]

I would not tow with a midsize truck or SUV since they typically top out around 5000 pounds. Not only is the R1T 2000 pounds more than that, but the additional resistance from the permanent magnet motors generating electricity will make the perceived load on the tow vehicle that much higher.

Yes I understand those parameters. That's the main point of the video. Honestly when you are off-road and a person is stuck and needs assistance no one ever says, "sorry, you exceed my vehicle tow rating I can't help you"

In emergency situations people do temporary pulls all the time. The point of this exercise is to see if a commonly sized vehicle you might be around while off-road can accomplish the task. I've personally yanked all sorts of sizes of trucks out of a stuck situation in my 4runner and it's doing just fine.

More importantly to your point, we aren't talking about pulling the Rivian at dangerous highway speeds, but offroad and only fast enough to regen. If that's only 10 mph then that's good enough!

 

[Dirtcom_AJ]

Jason from Engineering Explained did this with a Ford Raptor and a Tesla Model 3



It will answers a few fun questions

Haha yes I love that video. So theoretically IF I can actually pull the R1T with my 13mpg V8 4runner on dirt, together we are more efficient ?

 

[beatle]

Yes I understand those parameters. That's the main point of the video. Honestly when you are off-road and a person is stuck and needs assistance no one ever says, "sorry, you exceed my vehicle tow rating I can't help you"

In emergency situations people do temporary pulls all the time. The point of this exercise is to see if a commonly sized vehicle you might be around while off-road can accomplish the task. I've personally yanked all sorts of sizes of trucks out of a stuck situation in my 4runner and it's doing just fine.

More importantly to your point, we aren't talking about pulling the Rivian at dangerous highway speeds, but offroad and only fast enough to regen. If that's only 10 mph then that's good enough!

From your first post it just sounded like you wanted to see what would happen. If this is off road, depending on how challenging the trail is, you'd really be pushing it by dragging the Rivian up a hill, over obstacles, and with less traction. Yes, in a true emergency people do what they need to do, and maybe everything would work out fine, but for "research" this just sounds like a bad idea.

Then again, there's generally no "need" to go on an off-road trail in the first place, but people do it because it's fun. If you think the idea would be fun to prove/disprove, just go do it under that premise and let us know how it works out.

 

[HaveBlue]

I've seen 4cyl 4Runners and 6cyl FJ40s pull RVs out of the sand. They are built much stronger than they appear. I've towed numerous broken down rigs up bad trails. Towing a Rivian would be no different than a full sized Landcruiser.

 

[zymolysis]

you'd really be pushing it by dragging the Rivian up a hill, over obstacles, and with less traction.

I think that's a different question altogether. If a Rivian runs out of charge on a backroad, you'd want to pull it the easiest way (downhill, if possible) in order to tow charge it. And you certainly wouldn't try to tow charge uphill or over obstacles.

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