Hi,

I'm (hopefully!) about to purchase a MY2020 L&K estate and I'm trying to work out the best tow bar to fit, I've read through the forum but can't see much for the MKIII Superb.

Having spoken to my local dealer it's £1,400 for the OEM tow bar! I can see quite a few options online around £800-900 but I'm concerned about whether they will work with the parking sensors, reversing camera etc.

Any suggestions?

Thank
Robert (potentialy Superb owner in a few days...)

Make sure any quotes you get include full dedicated electrics for the car and that they will undertake all programming.

I have factory spec swivel down towbar and it's excellent but expensive to fit after build.

I had after market towbar fitted to my superb estate. I went for a removable swan neck type with dedicated wiring. Cost about £700 ish. I have had no problems with it, reversing sensors work with or with out the tow ball fitted.

Thanks both, I stumbled on this link which seems to be for the official tow bar (the kit at least) and it looks like there are lots of extra bits that the official kit includes. Maybe it's just being over cautious.

I'll have to see how it goes this weekend with the car and then make a decision.

Park's Motor Group

SKODA Tow bar SUPERB III

The use value of your SKODA SUPERB car can be significantly increased with a foldable tow bar from the SKODA Genuine Accessories portfolio. It is made of high performance materials. It passed the l...

I

Factory swivel

Thanks for that, useful to see what it looks like. That's the one I've had a quote of £1,400 for!

Just spoke to a different dealer and whilist he quoted me a similar price, he also said it's expensive and they have plenty of customers with 3rd party tow bars on their cars that work well.

I'm thinking a 3rd party detachable swan neck bar might be the best option, looks like around £900-950 fitted including the vehicle specific wiring harness.

Hi,

There's one point that that is often forgotten or not mentionned to explain why there's an important price difference between real OEM and OEM-like tow bar:

2nd fan for radiator cooling!

If you intend to use a tow bar just for a bike carrier or a small trailer, I think an OEM-like tow bar can do the job. BUT if you intend to tow a caravan, I would say an OEM-like tow bar may be a kind of gambling with your engine, which is not worth the money saving compared to the real OEM.

Just to sum up the specific functions related to tow bar option, when a trailer is plugged:

• Parking sensors disabled

• Rear fog light disabled (to avoid reflexion on the front of the caravan and being dazzled in the centre rearview mirror).

• ESP anti-sway function activated

• Trailer assist function activated on the reverse cam screen.

• Control laws of the 2nd radiator fan implemented

• Maybe some others I don't remember.

All of these must be added using VCDS. The wiring alone is not enough...

Then choose the right one for your needs, but with full awareness. 😉

Edited 16 May, 20251 yr by Bap33

I'm going to be towing a 4 wheel car trailer with a car on, total weight ~900Kg (it's a Caterham 7 so a very small trailer with a lightweight car). No idea how that compares with a caravan though.

Things are never simple are they :-)

9 minutes ago, rgrigsby said:

I'm going to be towing a 4 wheel car trailer with a car on, total weight ~900Kg (it's a Caterham 7 so a very small trailer with a lightweight car). No idea how that compares with a caravan though.

Things are never simple are they :-)

99% of aftermarket towbars don't have the factory cooling mods and manage fine towing average single axle caravans of around 1500kg.

I doubt the £1400 includes the cooling mods.

Cooling improvements differ model and year. It could be extra fans, extra gearbox cooling or simply a modified grill.

For the UK I wouldn't bother. We are not towing over the alps at 30 degrees.

Edited 17 May, 20251 yr by logiclee

29 minutes ago, rgrigsby said:

I'm going to be towing a 4 wheel car trailer with a car on, total weight ~900Kg (it's a Caterham 7 so a very small trailer with a lightweight car). No idea how that compares with a caravan though.

Things are never simple are they :-)

I think you'll be fine. This is a reasonably light load. Compliments on the Super Seven! 😉

I towed a Dacia Spring on a two-axle trailer is it was fairly effortless, I used DCC on Sport to minimize a bothering "shunt" that I never had on my earlier haul-car ... but being a P38 Range Rover is much heavier and with separate ladder chassis ...

I just got a L&K Estate and so am wondering this although I really would only want to have a 4 bike unit attached. Does anyone know if I would still need the cooling mods (no tow bar prep on mine unfortunately)?

Would there be any issues with insurance or warranty (presumably yes on warranty - I have the 2 year warranty on the current PCP deal) if you got a tow bar without the proper cooling mod?

I would not think this could be a problem ....

A note for all those with the swiwel tow, make sure you drop it once in a while, especially now after the bad season, and spray some oil or at least WD40/grease in the hinge mechanism!

Also, I've notice some rust pitting on mine, although it is greased and with a rubber protector.

I am thinking to create some sort of "cover" for that hole, all sorts of crap go in there ....

13 minutes ago, leolito said:

I would not think this could be a problem ....

A note for all those with the swiwel tow, make sure you drop it once in a while, especially now after the bad season, and spray some oil or at least WD40/grease in the hinge mechanism!

Also, I've notice some rust pitting on mine, although it is greased and with a rubber protector.

I am thinking to create some sort of "cover" for that hole, all sorts of crap go in there ....

Used my factory swivel towbar for the first time last week. It's been tucked away for the last 10 months from new.

To be fair it's spotless but I greased everything up anyway. I've had plenty of issues with detachables and swivels in the past.

I tow a caravan, so had a TowTrust removable towbar fitted by a local towbar specialist, had one on my previous Superb too, does exactly what you'd expect a towbar to do very well and its easy to use too.

Specialist used a full dedicated wiring kit and it was properly coded in to the car too, so shows the indicator warning on the dash, when in reverse a picture of the car shows on infotainment screen with a caravan hitched up, the rear sensors disabled but the fronts still active.

Also switches of the rear fog light and I also believe the reverse lights too, as well as disabling the car blind spot warning system.

All for just over £700.

I enquired at Skoda when I was buying the car and the saleswoman told me to get an independent quote because Skoda quote by the hour, it would be silly money and it would be a lot cheaper.

Edited 18 May, 20251 yr by yesman

21 hours ago, Mr_Bigglesworth said:

I just got a L&K Estate and so am wondering this although I really would only want to have a 4 bike unit attached. Does anyone know if I would still need the cooling mods (no tow bar prep on mine unfortunately)?

Would there be any issues with insurance or warranty (presumably yes on warranty - I have the 2 year warranty on the current PCP deal) if you got a tow bar without the proper cooling mod?

As far as I'm aware, from buying my previous Superb, the cooling mod is only needed on a 2.0TDi, 190/200bhp, DSG, 4x4, I know this because I was looking at one that exact spec and asked Skoda for a quote for a Towbar and the computer said NO, much to their surprise, it was when they looked in to it they found that this specific engine, gearbox and drivetrain needed a cooling mod fitted on the production line to be ready for a Towbar to be fitted.

I dropped the 4x4 and then they could get a quote, used an independent Towbar specialist anyway.

Ah that's useful to know, mines a 2.0TDI 190 but FWD so hopefully should be OK. I'm going to speak to a couple of local tow bar companies today to get some proper quotes.

Just following up on this, I ended up getting a Towtrust tow bar fitted and used it for the first time this week. The car tows well, although I ended up in sport mode most of the time to stop some gentle rocking on the suspension, various things such as a trailer indicator light show up on the dash. It also shows a picture of the trailer when reversing alongside the reversing camera.

However I do get two informational warnings when starting the car :-

Trailer side assist unavailable - Just reading the manual and I think this maybe that the blind spot alert system is disabled with a trailer connected

Rear traffic assist unavailable - As with the side assist the manual seems to suggest this is correctly disabled when a trailer is connected

One other thing I noticed is I the "front assist" big red collision warning appeared in the middle of the dashboard a few times whilst in traffic, I've never seen this before. I have a theory that with the trailer lowering the rear ride height is it possible the radar at the front isn't pointing in the right direction? the circumstances in which it triggered I was approaching a car in front but not excessively fast and no different to when I've driven without the trailer.

Any thoughts?

Thanks

Robert

The warnings are correct but I've not had an issue with front assist. I usually have a nose weight of around 85-90kg

Thanks, I'll double check nose weight although I'd be surprised if it was any more than that.

one potential issue to be aware of when fitting aftermarket towbar is the possibility of water getting into the spare wheel well.

dedie could you expand on that? unsure why it would be any different to a factor fit towbar, or do they seal up some of the gaps?

Sounds like something to look out for.

4 minutes ago, rgrigsby said:

dedie could you expand on that? unsure why it would be any different to a factor fit towbar, or do they seal up some of the gaps?

Sounds like something to look out for.

i had/have this issue with mine also