This is not necessarily true.

Having said that, towing with a modern automatic has a lot of advantages.

I'm obviously a fan of manual transmissions, but I don't get why people seek them out in trucks or SUV's, particularly when towing.

a) I don't see myself excited about shifting when driving in those scenarios b) a torque converter has real advantages.

I agree. She's currently driving 2002 Ford Explorer with a stick. Surely there's no joy in that.

Yeah I would worried about burning my clutch up towing.

My friend’s dad had a manual transmission Range Rover that he would tow a boat with and went through a bunch of clutches on it. Not sure if was any good at using it though.

Apparently those vintage manual Land Rovers command beaucoup $$$$.

They want the full sensory experience of rowing gears in a 1970's U-Haul, without having to buy a U-Haul? :dunno: That's the only thing I can think of.

Nah, It was a first or second gen discovery which I assume is not worth anything.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Land_Rover_Discovery

It was also rusting out too from being backed into the ocean to drop off the boat(still not a excuse for rusting I think) He took it hunting too, was kind of cool to see it being properly used.

:lol:

Only speaking from my experience, John, but it was in the 90's

I owned a 91 exploder 5 speed, then a 93 exploder with automatic transmission. Same six cylinder engine, both 4x4, same wheelbase.

The automatic could tow almost double what the 5 speed could, at least according to Ford's numbers . . .I never tried towing with the 5 speed but used the automatic to tow my 21 foot boat

Maybe it was just that Ford clutches suxs! lol

Typically that's because the transmission can't handle the extra strain but it's not universal. In the case of the Ram 2500, they tune down the engine to make the manual transmission survive. But the towing capacity is really not affected much.

Anecdotally.. a buddy of mine has an early 2000's F250 7.3 turbodiesel with a 6-speed transmission (incidentally, the same ZF that was used in the later C4 Corvette). The last time I drove that truck, we were towing a 3,500lb (empty!) trailer with two small cars on it, so figure around 8,500lbs with gear. Plus the weight of the truck (6,000lbs?) and four passengers plus a bed full of crap... it was pretty heavy rolling down the road.

I actually really liked the manual for that tow. Automatics like to hunt gears and being able to select a gear and hold it for long grades (up or down) is really nice. But this was back before automatics had 6 or more ratios. These days, there's just no point to towing with a stick anymore.

I don't recall him going through clutches, but with over 300,000 miles on that truck the manual transmission was certainly not a weak point.