Towing with A frame
Hi all, I'm sure there's loads of info/discussions on the forum about towing a car on an "A" frame behind a motorhome (but can never seem to find anything I'm looking for) in France & Spain.
We want to go to Spain via France for approx 4-6 weeks in May-June-July 2021, we would also like to tow our Smart fortwo behind, so once the motorhome is set up on site, we can venture out & about in our car, but there seems to be lots of confusion about whether it's legal or not.
When the car is on the A frame it is classified as a trailer, which is legal, but I cant find out if this is so in France or Spain, heard some people get fined, some have no issues, so I'm not sure.
Any advice or help would be appreciated, as usual
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You may get away with it in France - it depends which police officers see you - but you will be stopped soon after you cross the border into Spain . You may well be fined and you will be ordered to separate the outfit for your partner to drive the Smart car separately. Your alternatives are to load your car on to a trailer or to hire a car in Spain.
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Like the others above, towing a car on an A frame in Spain is not legal.
We used to tow our car behind our MH, have done so in Germany, Belgium, Netherlands, Luxembourg and France never Spain as we knew that we could be stopped and fined and made to separate the car from MH.
In both German and Belgium we were stopped by the police and told it is illegal to tow a car behind another vehicle. The police didn't fine us but pointed out that we should refrain from doing so. We do know of folk who have been fined in Germany.
After the second time of being stopped we decide that we wouldn't take the car again as it just put a dampener on the holiday, if you are always looking over your shoulder for the police.
Hire a car in Spain and use the money saved from paying less on the ferry and fuel. You can't stay on some aires if towing a car.
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posted in error.
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Hi
Some good advice above. My experience is we towed into Spain for two years and both times while in convoy with another motorhome/car we were stopped and ordered to separate the car and were given fines. In Spain there are different laws regarding towing a car. Only a Spanish registered breakdown company(a Grua) can tow a car on any public highway. Spain doesn't recognise a towed car as being a trailer. Many folk do it without problem but also many do. When stopped by the Guardia Civil Trafico, you can show them all manner of paperwork given to you by the a frame installer in the UK saying how legal it is but that will not wash. If you are fluent in Spanish you can have a lively argument (done that) but it will still won't have a favoured result.
I towed on a frame for eight years in the UK and France but Spain is now my country of choice so I now have a suitable trailer for my car and also the loads of stuff that we apparently may need!
Your choice my friend
JK
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Hi
We live in Spain and the A frame as become a bit of a cash cow now for the Spanish authorities, the last couple of years they have drafted extra Police/Trafico officers into the coastal areas around October time on wards and every Sunday you will find road blocks up, This is obviously not just for A frame usage but last winter alone they fined 57 motorhomer's who had A frames attached and this was only in the Valencian region and yet still people try their luck.
Like people have suggested above have a look at car hire which is very cheap if you stay for a month somewhere, one other word of warning watch your length of stay because if you go over the 90 day the Guardia will know you are travelling with out insurance.
Phil
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You say that when the car is on the A frame it is classified as a trailer. That is true but then it must fulfil all requirements of a trailer and that includes whole vehicle type approval. However, an A-frame/car combination has never been type approved and that is the reason why it is not legal on the Continent. Strictly speaking it's not legal in the UK either, but it's tolerated.
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I agree with Deleted User User. My insurance covers me all year and throughout the EU regardless of how long I stay in any country. The policy considers the whole EU as domestic.
The 90 day limit only applies if you are considered to have taken up residency in Spain,
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Evening
I think Phil may be referring to the new rules after brexit regarding the 90 days?
JK
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Strictly speaking it's not legal in the UK either, but it's tolerated.
What about for recovery? I know you've said before you'd never heard of this type of A frame, but some are intended for recovery only and attach to the stricken car via chains/straps over the lower radius arms & not via rose joints attached to the front of the towed car.
Like this .... Recovery A frame
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They’re permitted for emergency recovery only over short distances. The same applies to a spec lift.
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Hi Popty, As you say there has been a lot of discussion about A frames over the years but would have to say this thread is pretty unanimous in saying its a no no.
Our MH buddies who we holiday with considered this option many years ago and the explanation passed on to me was that its basically to do with how the law works sur le continent as opposed to here in the UK.
Here laws forbid certain things so, as there is no law saying you cant use an A frame, its OK.
Abroad however laws permit certain things and, as there is no law that says you can use an A frame then you are not, as illustrated by the posts above, allowed to.
Our friends decided on a small scooter carried on a rack but then, in a mad testosterone moment, bought a 600cc Bergman which was too big for the rack so he bought a trailer to carry it.
This has now been supplanted by two electric bikes mainly due to the cost of taking the trailer abroad and the issues face on sites, and more especially on aires, with finding room for the trailer.
Last year he had a new shed delivered and I did suggest he could put it on the trailer and take this with his car to save all the hassle!
One last thing, many people are encouraged to think its OK to use an A frame as the know someone who has used one with no problems.
To me its a bit like speeding you may do it habitually and never get caught, you may do it once and get caught but neither situation is justification for doing it in the first place.
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Of course not Easy, that's reserved for people who change from a caravan to a MH!!
As I don't do emojis should make clear I am joking.
We enjoy a lot of banter re each others choices of outfit and have fantastic holidays together and its where we go, and what we do, that matters not which type of tin can we spend the night in.
The reference to sheds was due to the annual mickey take by colleagues when LVs of all shapes and sizes descended on Cornwall and I was referred to as a "shed tugger"...............that's the polite version!
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Sorry David didn't explain myself too well, i did mean from 31st December when it looks like 90 days will be the limit and the reason i mention this is because my Spanish insurance have written to me to say from 1st July just gone i can only spend 90 days in the UK and will need a green card from them.
The OP did state next year and i do see quite a few comments on here and other sites asking about stays in Spain next year for six months or more and some expert always comes along saying that the Spanish can't police your length of stay and this when the first thing you do on entering a site is show your passport to be copied which is then sent to the local Guardia and they will then know if you have stayed longer then 90 days in Spain which will then invalidate your insurance resulting in a fine.Cash cow me thinks i was just trying to add a bit of caution.
Phil
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It would still be difficult to enforce if one regularly moves around and never stays more than 90 days on any one campsite. No-one except the insurance company itself can invalidate an otherwise perfectly valid insurance policy. Abroad, one can only be required to re-register the vehicle after a set period of time if there is reason to believe that one has taken up residency there and that would involve the need to insure the vehicle locally, too.
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I assume that from the start of new Brexit rules on 1 January 2021 all UK passports will be scanned on arrival at ferry ports of Bilbao and Santander, and scanned again on departure - with the possibility of fines for anyone overstaying the permitted 90 days. Other countries have been fining overstayers for many years - Thailand for instance only allows 30 days and fines are charged at the border on departure after that. Will Spain follow suit?
The options for those UK winter visitors wanting to spend more than 90 days in Spain looks to be a Spanish long stay visa, which for a fee of 80 euros covers a period up to 180 days.
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As there are no controls once you are in the Schengen area, any time limit must logically apply to the whole Schengen area, not for each country.
Conversely, there is no indication as yet how entry into the UK is going to be handled for foreign visitors. Up to now EU nationals don't require a passport. It remains to be seen whether that will continue to apply.
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Yes total time in Shengen area may well be totted up. How? Computer scan on entering Shengen area from Uk and the same again on departure from Schengen - just as you can go from state to state in USA and be caught on final departure. If UK government is playing hardball with EU citizens the EU will hit back. They have big computers !
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Am I right in thinking that its 90 days in any 180 days. Which means if you have been in Spain say for 90 days you cannot go back to any Shengen countries for another 90 days?
That's going to play havoc with some folk us included. If we go to Spain in 2021 after the end of Nov we would have problems going to Lanzarote in March unless we get a visa.
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