I am looking for advice on getting the caravan in and out of the garage.
The road is at an angle and the driveway slopes towards the house, with very little room to spare to get through the gates at the bottom of the slope. The drive then continues, very narrow, along the side of the house to the garage, the entrance of which is offset. So reversing the caravan from road to garage is impossible.
I figure if I attach a block and tackle to the tow ball of the car and to the van, I can lower while my wife steers to get down the slope, or back up the slope to do the reverse task.
The drive way from road to gate is 9 metres, then another 13m of flat drive down the side of the house. The flat part I can manage by hand, so I need a system that will allow me to move the van a minimum of, say, 11-12 metres.
The van weighs c 800KG - too heavy to hold back on the slope.
- What system do I need to cope with with that weight? I though perhaps a 3:1 might be enough, but maybe I should have 5:1? The catch of course, is that to move 12m, I would need 60m of rope!
- Can I get away with thin'ish nylon braided line, or must I use rope, or even cable.
- I can't mount a strong point in the road, so I plan to park the car sort of sideways on, so that the tow ball is centred to act as the fixed point off the top of the drive, in the flat of the road. Is that sensible?
- If I get a length of chain to wrap around/through the frame of the van tow bar, I plan to use that as the attachment for the moving pulley block. Is that OK, or would a plate and tow ball be better?
- If someone can tell me how to do it, I could try to measure the slope of the drive?
If you have to drop caravan in road then you can control it backwards down slope with handbrake, no need for winch. Obviously brakes would need to be serviced & handbrake in good repair. To get caravan out push to end of flat section, reverse car down drive, hitch up & tow caravan out, yes?
If there is no room to do that then how would you get caravan out of drive once you have winched it up there with car parked across drive? If there is room to tow caravan out of drive, then with a bit of practise you could probably reverse it in?
You can calculate it, but need to know the steepest gradient of the drive. If it's 1 in 8 then you have and 8 to 1 mechanical advantage so the pull on a 4 to 1 block will be 800/8/4 = 25kg.
For 3 to 1 800/8/3 = 34kg.
To haul it up you need to add for the friction of tyres etc & rolling resistance. You need to measure the pull needed on level ground for that and add it to the weight of the van.
I have to say the best way will be a motor mover as it is quite difficult to steer like that.
As for strength of rope it will be the pull you have to put on. So in the example I gave it will be 25kg plus the friction/rolling resistance. The rope attaching it to the van and the anchor will take the
My boat weighs about 160kg on it's launching trolley and I pull that easily up a steep launching ramp with a 2 to 1 block. I can just pull it up with no block but it is a struggle.
I used 8mm ordinary rope from screwfix. £7 for 30m which did me. It needs to be fairly thick so you can grip it comfortably. There are some high tech ropes we use in sailing which will lift the whole caravan off the ground yet still only be about 6mm dia.
You could measure the slope using a spirit level. You nee the distance along the slope and the rise to calculate the gradient. Gradient = slope / rise to 1.
To do it in 1 pull you will need a continuous length of rope which will be an awful lot.
Alternatively you can get an electric winch which you could power from the car socket with a thin cable.
Your post is a bit of a brain teaser. I think I have worked out what your drive looks like. The only thing I can't work out is how steep it is. I am assuming that your house is lower than the road and that level ground is 9m from the road (correct me if I am wrong).
If that is the case then what is the height difference between the road and the base house?
Alex, you have the right idea about the shape and direction. I don't know the amount of rise and, unless my spirit level gives me an angle away from horizontal, I don't know how to measure the rise. Any clues gratefully received. Will happily look at motor mover if can find a suitable one. That I raised in a separate topic.
Put the spirit level on the drive and raise the low end until the spirit level is level. (Bubble in middle)
Measure the height of the underside of the level above the drive and the distance along the drive.
The gradient is the / height of the underside of the level above the drive.
For example:
Height above drive is 4 inches.
Distance along the drive is 40 inches
Gradient is 40 / 4 = 10 so slope is 1 in 10.
If you only have a short spirit level put it on a piece of wood.
I looked at our boat slipway today and reckon it's about 1 in 9
We did haul the club safety boat out last week and tried the 2 to 1 block system but 3 of us couldn't budge it. Got it to the top by towing it, then found both tyres were dead flat despite them felling quit hard by the kick test. That made it hard.
Letting it down the ramp a couple of us could manage it easily. Reckon it weighs about 400kg.
I still reckon a motor mover is the way to go if you can. Lowering it will mean you cant steer it.
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Topic: Sloping driveway
