Caravan security: a focus on AL-KO secure wheel lock and a guide to prevent theft and enhance travel safety

Wheel clamps come in various shapes and sizes, some fiddly to fix, some quick and easy, some chunky and complicated, others simple. But one is different from all of the rest. It’s the AL-KO Secure. It’s different because it bolts through the wheel itself, rather than clamping around it.

AL-KO tells us that the AL-KO Secure is rated by insurance companies and the caravan industry as the most secure anti-theft device available.

The lock has achieved the Sold Secure Diamond Standard (the highest level of accreditation from the organisation which is dedicated to reducing crime. Sold Secure Diamond Standard. AL-KO has the Secure tested every 12 months to ensure it remains at the highest level.

Caravan insurance

Many of the caravan specialist insurance companies offer hefty discounts for the use of this lock; our list on this page details some of them.

Since 2006 an increasing number of caravans on AL-KO chassis have been equipped with the receivers for these locks, or pre-punched holes in the back plate of the brake.

The locks are incredibly strong and heavy, beautifully engineered, with smooth edges and chunky bolts. They’re amazingly easy to fit – once you’ve lined up the receiver in a centre-point within the apertures in your alloy wheels, so that the bolt of the lock can go through the wheel and into the receiver.

How do you position a caravan with centimetre accuracy? With two people it’s easy. If you’re positioning your caravan on its pitch with the car, the passenger gets out, stands by the nearside wheel and guides the driver until the receiver is mid-way between two spokes of the wheel. If you’re siting your caravan on your own, that process is of course much more difficult and necessitates lots of getting out and looking.

AL-KO, though, have an answer, in the form of its Side Lift Jack. The idea is that jacking up the wheel enables you to turn it easily into the exact position needed. You keep the caravan attached to the car during the jacking process so that it’s secure.

This jack differs from the ones supplied with caravans because it has a mounting bracket that you bolt to the chassis.

Since 1992 AL-KO has provided holes in the chassis member to which you attach the jack support brackets, on each side of the chassis member. The brackets are L-shaped, so that one section rests against the caravan floor for extra rigidity,

Caravans older than 1992 will have to have these holes drilled. Using a bracket to secure a jack prevents the chassis from being put under twist-strain when it’s being jacked up. The 1,600kg Side Lift Jack costs £120.00.

For twin-axle caravans, using a jack is the only way you can line up the second wheel accurately; whereas positioning the first wheel can be done by passenger guidance as we described earlier, the second wheel is never going to be in exactly the same orbit.