Hitch Mount Tire Carrier.

[koda6966]

I decided to start practicing some of my welding skills a little more. I wanted to make some sort of tire carrier for my Cherokee, but I don't have a large amount of metal available to me without buying new.

I managed to find some 1/4" stainless steel plating, and some 2" square tubing in the scrap bin at work to play with. After cleaning it up, it's more than usuable. For the rim mount I have a Ranger rear shaft somewhere that should work.

I'll post up some pictures soon. Possibly mid week. Most of the mount is tig'd since I origionally didn't plan on painting it. But since I had to make the upright portion of it out of plain steel I'll be hiting it with primer and bedliner. I'll mig the axle shaft (drilled out and welded to both sides) to the upright for strength, with a gusset on the bottom side.

I'm aiming to have the whole unit with tire to only weight about 100lbs. If I go over it's no big deal. Right now It's only going to have a 235/75R15 but I'm setting the distance for the wheel mount to a 10.50 tire on my AR rims since they will eventually be on the Jeep.

Stay tuned!

 

[martin]

no pictures?

 

[koda6966]

I'll put them up tonight when I get home.

 

[koda6966]

Sorry again for the delay. I'm uploading some of the pictures as we speak.

I'm also going to have a bit of a delay in finishing it. I can't find the axle shaft I had planned to use. I'll have to take a trip to the yard and snag one.

 

[koda6966]

Terrible picture quality, and I don't have too many of the process, but here's the ones I have.

Keep in mind this is all made out of scrap metal that was being thrown out at work. I'm working with what I can find here. Haha.

This is the main bracket mostly put together. It's 3/16 (I believe) 2" square tubing with 1/4" plate for the sides. My welds could use a little work, but I'm incorperating a safety strap that will be attached from the hitch to the rim, just incase. I also welded a 2.5" x 2.5" plate on the front to close the tubing in, and a small 1" x 2.5" plate on the top to tie the two sides together.



Bad quality, but this is the bracket in my hitch. I have just enough clearance on the bumper, and should have good clearance from my wiper when the arm is installed.



Here's how it's going to mount to the arm. I wanted the pivot point on the bottom so that I could limit the downward movement of the arm. It would get old having to reach down to pick up the tire every time I get in my hatch.



I'm also making a stainless steel light bar. Pics of that should be in my build thread tomorrow if it doesn't snow.

 

[martin]

Oh no! not the snow excuse. More pictures, lol.

 

[koda6966]

Haha. I don't mix well with cold weather.

 

[Lil-Pony]

More more...

 

[UrbanRedneckKid]

You're gunna have to find a way to tightly secure it into your receiver. Hitches fit very sloppy, that thing will have 3"-4" of side to side movement at the top of the tire.

They sell spring loaded hitch pins, also you can put shims between your mount and the receiver.

When I was on the truck accessories business, this was a major concern with wheelchair platforms, especially the ones with ramps.

Another solution I personally came up with. This only works if your receiver tube isn't capped on the under side of the truck.
Plate the end of your hitch accessory, in this case tire mount, drill a hole and tap it for a 3/8" or 1/2" bolt. Now when you slide it in, thread in your bolt from the front side with a big washer against the receiver tube. That will load the hitch/ mount against the pin, and all your rattles and movement will be gone. It's best if you do this with a high quality hitch pin or 5/8" gr8 bolt with a shoulder that is at least 2.5" long.

Note, this is not to be used for towing and/or pulling. Only for accessories, spare mounts, hitch baskets, wheelchair platforms, bike racks, and such. Any pull load put on it, would be solely on the bolt which could fail.

Sent from my HTCONE using Tapatalk

 

[koda6966]

That wee bit of slop is already taken care of, when I test fit it I also checked to see how much play was in it. Not liking what I saw, I made a shim sleeve that fits inside of the receiver.

I also put up a picture for the light bar I was talking about. Tonight I mounted the lights to it and started the wiring. Photo and details are in my Jeeps build thread, there's a link for it in my signature. I'm going to make a run to the store in the AM for a few essentials (silly me, I forgot to pick up shrink tubing) and then I'll hopefully finish the install on that.

Trying to get all of these side projects out of the way.

 

[koda6966]

Whelp, had to wait a bit on this since I couldn't locate my axle shaft. Went to the junkyard today and pulled one from a late 90's explorer that should work fine. Hopefully getting that welded in tomorrow then it's time for primer and paint!

I ended up taking a stainless 5/8" bolt and cutting it down/adding a hole for the removable pin. I also saw an easy pull hitch pin today at Harbor Freight that caught my eye, so I picked that up as well. I'm still unsure of which style I'll end up using. Imagine the bottom bolt cut down with the nut tight, and the easy pull pin cut to the length of my 5/8 bolt. Both have various pros and cons, and whichever I don't use will be retired to the glovebox in-case of theft.

Bolt style.



Easy pull style.



Comparison.


Yes I know some of the angles are off and the right side is slightly taller. All of that will be addressed in the finishing stage.

 

[Jim Oaks]

Looking good. Can't wait to see it finished.

 

[koda6966]

Thanks Jim!

I might redo the bottom mount for it, I want to still be able to tow my 5x8 trailer without removing my spare. Here's one of the ideas I was looking at that would use the existing mount. Basically I'd take a 2" drop draw bar and notch it (bottom left) so that it will fit tight to the mount. Then I'd weld it on every seam and one or two bolts through the whole thing for good measure. Depending on how it looks I might fill in the gap on the sides as well.

I also thought of buying an extended draw bar and using that instead, but I'm sick of all the cutting and drilling. Only working on it for 20 minutes or so a day kind of makes it hard to start over too.



At the top right is my plate bracket I sketched up. I'll have to buy all of the materials for this one, but I've gotta do what I've gotta do. It would be bolted right to the bottom left of the hatch, for easy access to the wiring needed to make the lights function. I'm not worried about the larger light popping fuses on me, since the small LED strip probably uses less power than the standard incandecent bulb.

 

[Jim Oaks]

I'd like to use the info and any photos you have for a new section I'm adding to the tech library.

 

[koda6966]

Feel free Jim. I wouldn't mind seeing one of these on an Explorer or even a Ranger. It's part of why I made it so that parts can easily be modified, I'm still unsure as to if my next daily driver will be another Cherokee or if I'll pick up an older Explorer.

Now I wish I paid more attention to detail and had everything perfect.