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Camplite and Bearcat Travel Trailers / Re: 2" Receiver Design For Bike Rack on Alum. LL Trailers
« Last post by alazear on Today at 01:10:37 PM »Hi Gary,
That sounds fine to me.
A couple considerations before you commit to install this:
1. The shipping is going to be a pricey, as the the basic hitch is already factory welded to a 1/2" piece of plate when I buy it from etrailer and thus a bit over built before I even started. This didn't bother me at all as I kind of liked it that way, overbuilt. But it is heavy.
2. You really want to think about how you are going to drill the upper two holes through the alum. frame. Don't underestimate the difficulty of doing this. The bottom two holes are no problems and just take seconds with a sharp drill bit, standard drill + a bit of precision-care. Alum. drills fast.
The upper two holes are a problem. It took me an hour each to drill those upper two holes, properly aligned and to proper size. I used all kinds of cobbled together tools to do this, together with custom cut sacrificial drill bits I tossed in the garbage afterward; they were trashed. With better close quarters equipment it might have gone more smoothly. I used what I had. I almost gave up doing this, and was going to cut the bumper off to drill these and was then going to TIG weld the alum. bumper back on afterward just to accomplish drilling those two silly upper holes. In the end, I didn't have to do this, but it was tedious and slow.
The design I came up with was the following for this 2' receiver: I wanted those two upper through holes as high up as possible on that 2 x 7" alum. frame member and my steel plates to counteract the torque of the bike rack pulling down and thus handle bumps in the road, etc. with two mt. bikes attached. It worked really well. I doubt that frame member could tow anything behind, even a small trailer. You'd want to go into the longitudinal frame members for that. But for a bike rack, I like it.
The design problem one cannot see from the outside is ~4 1/2" up from the bottom of that frame member there is an alum. factory welded bar, 1/2-3/4" square or so that supports the rear edge of black tank. It's welded to that 2 x 7" frame member from the inside. You can't see that welded piece unless you drop the underbelly and look up. This prevented me from positioning the upper through bolts for the receiver any higher up the plate than I did. If I could, it would add even more rigidity and make the drilling of them much easier from the outside too. However, this would have involved dropping the black tank and re-plumbing, and I wasn't going to go there. This means that the upper two holes end up about in the middle of where the bumper is, as to not interfere with the bar that supports the black tank on the inside. Thus, the drilling problem. Those two holes cannot be drilled from the inside either, as again, the black tank is smack in the way. However, once they are drilled and you get the proper length 7/16" grade 8 bolts at any good hardware store, the mounting of the bracket is straightforward with socket and wrench. It's the drilling that took time.
I'm away from home traveling right now for the next couple weeks. I be happy to weld it up for you when I get home, if you're still interested.
Adam
That sounds fine to me.
A couple considerations before you commit to install this:
1. The shipping is going to be a pricey, as the the basic hitch is already factory welded to a 1/2" piece of plate when I buy it from etrailer and thus a bit over built before I even started. This didn't bother me at all as I kind of liked it that way, overbuilt. But it is heavy.
2. You really want to think about how you are going to drill the upper two holes through the alum. frame. Don't underestimate the difficulty of doing this. The bottom two holes are no problems and just take seconds with a sharp drill bit, standard drill + a bit of precision-care. Alum. drills fast.
The upper two holes are a problem. It took me an hour each to drill those upper two holes, properly aligned and to proper size. I used all kinds of cobbled together tools to do this, together with custom cut sacrificial drill bits I tossed in the garbage afterward; they were trashed. With better close quarters equipment it might have gone more smoothly. I used what I had. I almost gave up doing this, and was going to cut the bumper off to drill these and was then going to TIG weld the alum. bumper back on afterward just to accomplish drilling those two silly upper holes. In the end, I didn't have to do this, but it was tedious and slow.
The design I came up with was the following for this 2' receiver: I wanted those two upper through holes as high up as possible on that 2 x 7" alum. frame member and my steel plates to counteract the torque of the bike rack pulling down and thus handle bumps in the road, etc. with two mt. bikes attached. It worked really well. I doubt that frame member could tow anything behind, even a small trailer. You'd want to go into the longitudinal frame members for that. But for a bike rack, I like it.
The design problem one cannot see from the outside is ~4 1/2" up from the bottom of that frame member there is an alum. factory welded bar, 1/2-3/4" square or so that supports the rear edge of black tank. It's welded to that 2 x 7" frame member from the inside. You can't see that welded piece unless you drop the underbelly and look up. This prevented me from positioning the upper through bolts for the receiver any higher up the plate than I did. If I could, it would add even more rigidity and make the drilling of them much easier from the outside too. However, this would have involved dropping the black tank and re-plumbing, and I wasn't going to go there. This means that the upper two holes end up about in the middle of where the bumper is, as to not interfere with the bar that supports the black tank on the inside. Thus, the drilling problem. Those two holes cannot be drilled from the inside either, as again, the black tank is smack in the way. However, once they are drilled and you get the proper length 7/16" grade 8 bolts at any good hardware store, the mounting of the bracket is straightforward with socket and wrench. It's the drilling that took time.
I'm away from home traveling right now for the next couple weeks. I be happy to weld it up for you when I get home, if you're still interested.
Adam
