Towing

I’m thinking of buying a caravan, which I would tow with my 2017 Holden Captiva LTZ diesel. But I’m confused by conflicting advice. The instruction book says the ball weight is 150 kg and the drawbar pull is 2000 kg, but I have seen a review that says the drawbar pull is 1500 kg. The instruction book does not state the kerb weight, but my dealer advises that it is 1920 kg. What is right?

We purchased a 2015-plated Ford Everest in mid-2016. It's a beautiful car around town, however, when we set off on a 12 months trip around Australia at Christmas 2016, we started to have issues. We were towing 2.85-tonne with a GCM (as per weighbridge) of just over 5.7-tonne, so we were within the advertised specs (3-tonne towing, 6-tonne GCM). When we left Adelaide and the temperature reached 40 degrees, the Ford packed up with a turbo error message, which was claimed to be a glitch. From then on, we received ‘spanner' errors and the car would go in limp mode whenever under load. Time would vary from one to seven hours, driven by outside temperature and totally random. Ironically, the car would not log the errors in the on-board computer, so between Adelaide and Perth we were stuck three times and always got the same answer from dealers and Ford: "No log entry, nothing we can do. Drive to a dealer with the error active". Easy said, but hard to do when you're in the middle of the Nullarbor and your next dealership is 20 hours drive away in limp mode. This was escalated with Ford Australia, but we were told to simply “try a fourth time”, on the way to Broome. With three kids in the back, we took a rain check. Ford advised it would take them five to 10 working days to come back "with a solution, or an offer". It took a Toyota dealer 10 minutes to make an offer and we switched to a LandCruiser in Perth. Based on my experience and those of other caravaners we've met along the way, the Everest is not suited for towing at or near the advertised capacity of 3-tonne over extended periods of time in the harsh Australian climate. Full stop. Half of Everest owners we met on this trip either had issues with the turbo, or else the transmission. Ford has its head in the sand and will try to blame the issues on your wiring harness or bull bar, as they tend to be third party items. What can a consumer do in this situation? We lost a lot of money on a car in 12 months of ownership because it's not capable of doing what it's advertised for?