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I have a 2016 150 Prado, which I bought second-had a few months ago. I recentgy removed the rear seats and installed a set of drawers, with fridge and slide.
Other exsiting mods include:
- front bar and side steps
- Rhino roof rack / backbone system
- dual battery system
- Rhino batwing awning
Obviously all of these add to the vehicle mass, so I thought I would put it on a weighbridge .....
With just me, full tanks, and not much in the drawers or fridge it weighed in at 2.8T. With a rated GVM of 3T, this only leaves 200kg for a passenger plus any luggage we might need
, let alone the additioanal ball weight if towing.
The car is also fitted with a suspension upgrade courtesy of Climax Suspension, which has Kings springs and Bilstein shocks and cost about$3.5k (receipt supplied by the original owner).
Unfortunately this suspension upgrade is (apparently) not certified for a GVM increase. If you want that, apparently you need the certified Lovells suspension upgrade. When I enquired about that upgrade I was quoted $4.5k (in Adelaide).
Alternatively, I could have the existing upgrade 'certified', also at a cost of about $4k.
The other confusing issue is that as the car is certified after registraion, any certification is only a state, and not federal cedrtification. I assume that would only be an issue if I wanted to register the vehicle in another state, but not really sure.
Which at the end of the day all very disappointing, but not completely unexpected, given the well documented issues with GVM compliance.
At the moment I think I will just do nothing, and hope for the best when loaded up for a trip.
I am assuming there is no cheap solution to this issue, but always happy to receive any helpful feedback.
Thanks
Cam
Other exsiting mods include:
- front bar and side steps
- Rhino roof rack / backbone system
- dual battery system
- Rhino batwing awning
Obviously all of these add to the vehicle mass, so I thought I would put it on a weighbridge .....
With just me, full tanks, and not much in the drawers or fridge it weighed in at 2.8T. With a rated GVM of 3T, this only leaves 200kg for a passenger plus any luggage we might need
, let alone the additioanal ball weight if towing.The car is also fitted with a suspension upgrade courtesy of Climax Suspension, which has Kings springs and Bilstein shocks and cost about$3.5k (receipt supplied by the original owner).
Unfortunately this suspension upgrade is (apparently) not certified for a GVM increase. If you want that, apparently you need the certified Lovells suspension upgrade. When I enquired about that upgrade I was quoted $4.5k (in Adelaide).
Alternatively, I could have the existing upgrade 'certified', also at a cost of about $4k.
The other confusing issue is that as the car is certified after registraion, any certification is only a state, and not federal cedrtification. I assume that would only be an issue if I wanted to register the vehicle in another state, but not really sure.
Which at the end of the day all very disappointing, but not completely unexpected, given the well documented issues with GVM compliance.
At the moment I think I will just do nothing, and hope for the best when loaded up for a trip.
I am assuming there is no cheap solution to this issue, but always happy to receive any helpful feedback.
Thanks
Cam
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