Over the course of more than a century, Aston Martin has forged an enviable reputation for delivering blue blood sports cars and grand tourers. Many of them, like the classic Vantage models, were serious heavyweights, but none was a tow car. Unsurprisingly, that changed with the DBX SUV, which, thanks to a twin-turbocharged 4.0-litre V8 from Mercedes-AMG and four-wheel drive, can pull a claimed 2700kg.
You’re unlikely to find a Bentley owner who needs to tow a caravan. But a historic racer that needs to be transported to the track? Well, that’s much more likely. There’s only one option for this sort of thing in the upper-crust British brand’s brochures, and that’s the Bentayga SUV.
All can tow up to 3500kg, including the gob-smackingly quick Bentayga Speed, which features the firm’s famed 626bhp 6.0-litre W12 that can fire it from 0-60mph in 3.8sec (and not available in Europe any more). Of course, towing this much will have a disastrous effect on the car’s already wallet-bashing 19.2mpg claimed efficiency.
It’s BMW that springs the first of our surprises, because who would have thought the BMW M5 super-saloon would be certified to have a tow bar? Its 616bhp 4.4-litre V8 isn’t short of torque, which helps the fast four-door pull up to 2000kg.
The same engine is used to even more impressive effect in the X5M and X6M SUVs, which are rated to haul 3000kg. For the smaller, 503bhp 3.0-litre straight-six-powered X3M and X4M, this figure drops to 2400kg.
The M3 isn’t currently homologated to allow towing, so if you want to hitch up a trailer to something 3 Series-shaped, you’ll have to settle for the M340i, which can cope with 1800kg.
When it comes to the brand’s ever expanding range of electric cars, the rapid 544bhp BMW i4 50M saloon is capable of pulling 1600kg, while the attention-grabbing iX 60M SUV manages 2500kg – hardly surprising, given its stump-pulling 749lb ft torque peak.