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arthur.nilsen

I have a 2001 Land Rover Freelander V6 auto that I use for towing my caravan of approx. 1200kg. When I tow up hills I usually let the gearbox decide if and when to change down, rather than me changing down manually. However most times it does not change down and the vehicle struggles to get up the hill, dropping down as low as 40km/hr. If I change down manually the revs get up around 3000 and the vehicle seems to tow much easier and certainly faster. My question really is should I let the gearbox decide to change gear or should I change down manually to keep the revs up, and if so what revs should I be trying to maintain?

ABayliss

As modern transmissions are adaptive, probably the reason yours isn't changing down as might perhaps be more appropriate for the load, is that you've done several thousand kms without the caravan, so it's maintaining the higher gear which it "thinks" you should normally be in.
So yes, if you think a lower gear is better and it stops the enging from labouring, then by all means, use the Tiptronic feature to shift down. It's part of the reason for the Tiptronic system.

arthur.nilsen

Thank you very much for this.