So rather than clutter up other threads with ideas on how to do this I figure I should just make a dedicated thread.
I have a goal of modifying my jeep to perform the following tasks...
A couple times a year I do this...
Now currently that's a 20' Bri-Mar full steel deck trailer. that full setup with all my tools and parts in the back of the jeep weighed in at 10,060# recently... a bit portly I'll admit and I'm working on that (mostly in replacing the trailer with one that weighs about 1000# less.)
I want to set things up on the jeep such that I'm not having a difficult time taking things off constantly to keep the weight of the jeep down for "normal" or "mall crawling" duties, but at the same time not spend hours putting stuff back on.
I'm not even sure where to start with my requirements and parts decriptions, so expect this post to be clarified as time goes on. I guess I'll start with the winch first though.
Winch:
used for pulling the car on the trailer if it breaks, standing up trees, pulling vehicles out of ditches, dragging trees up the hill side for conversion into firewood, other possible unknown uses.
currently it's in a 2" receiver bracket, which initially I thought was really good idea. I can stick it on the trailer or attach to the rear of the jeep and eventually to the front. so far I have not bought the front mount receiver hitch for various reasons...
now one problem I can see with having the backbone is... can I remove the winch from it so that I'm not carrying it around all the time (like in the summer when it's not needed alot) and can I remove it easily? I have to explore that. anyone who's got a backbone if they could chime in about that I'd appreciate it. I can rather easily solve the electrical aspects of it (already have a source for the needed high current connectors) but the bolting/unbolting from the actual backbone still presents a question.
I've used the winch several times hanging off the rear of the jeep and I've determined the following...
The rear tire needs to be removed if I want the winch directly in the hitch.
Or I need to leave the tailgate door completely open which means it flops around as I'm trying to align the jeep for a pull.
I need to use 24" of extension out of the hitch to make the winch clear the spare tire.
I accomplished the latter one time the problem was it was done with a 12" extension and a 12" step/platform extension, so I had 3 pins that were potential failure points. Not to mention if the pull had been anything off-axis it would have been either impossible or disasterous.
With regards to vehicle recovery onto the trailer, I recognize that whatever changes I make to the trailer (tire rack for example) have to consider the position of the winch and the angle of the line during a pull up.
Towing:
As the pictures show I tow an open car trailer a couple times a year. Hopefully that will actually grow (was actually planning 6 track days this year, but for various reasons most got canceled) both for track days and other purposes. Due to the design of the hitch I installed the receiver is tucked very far up under the jeep. that combined with the short draw bar I have results in me needing to remove the spare tire to even get the tongue on the ball, and the bracket from the door to operate the hand crank for the trailer foot. this obviously leaves me with out a mounted spare on the jeep. while yes I can carry the spare on the trailer (in fact it usually winds up going in the trunk of the car that's on the trailer!) or in the back of the jeep itself, access to the latter is severely compromised by the design of the trailer (jack). Now I am planning on replacing this trailer with a different one and hope to explore these problems in detail with the shop I'll be purchasing it from, but for the time being it's probably safe to say there's not going to be a trailer made such that the tongue jack will be out of the way of the tailgate completely. In addition the back of the jeep is frequently filled with various tools, tents, chairs, spare parts, coolers, luggage, etc. for the event i'm attending, so attempting to package the spare back there and still have easy access to it if needed presents a challenge.
An interesting design option that I observed (zone zero) is to attached an addtional receiver to the hitch, offset to one side. Hopefully the owner of this picture doesn't mind my liberating them.
This idea greatly intrigues me, in that I could create a permanent mounting spot for the spare, design the bracket to be folded down so the tailgate can be opened fully, and free up the weight off the door itself. note my door is bent from the bracket and I suspect the previous owner backed into something, so it would allow me to clean it up.
It would also allow the trailer tongue to mate up without any issues or further efforts... just insert the draw bar and hitch up.
Another quick thought was to see if I could move the spare tire mount more to the driver's side of the door, and still be able to open it fully. If anyone has done or tried that I'd appreciate your commentary.
The other option was to roof mount the spare. While I plan to add a basket up top for other reasons (front and rear lighting, possibly side lighting, luggage carrying, things I don't want IN the jeep, etc.) the prospects of attempting to retreive the spare from the roof do not thrill me, as well as the potential negative impact on the vehicle's roll center. while I don't believe the latter is a terribly great impact, I would like to investigate it. Also does it have a marked negative impact on fuel economy. This this is already a pig to start with, no need to make it more of one at least as much as I can avoid it. (although to be fair, my mixed driving gets me about 18mpg on regular, while my towing that rig nets me almost 17mpg on premium if I drive nicely.)
In the end I do not want to change the receiver position on the hitch if at all possible. the close positioning of the ball to the rear axle makes towing very stable and easy. while yes the trailer will "dance" sometimes I'm more inclined to blame it ON the trailer itself, given that it's been abused over it's life. Repairs I've had to make to it so far include a complete leaf spring assembly, 2 brakes, and it needs 2 tires badly. I also suspect the front axle isn't perfectly straight. hence why I want to get rid of it and get a new one.
Basket/Lighting:
The plan is to put up a Rola roof cargo basket with extension, for the purposes of external item storage, a place to mount lights, CB antenna mount location, the possiblity of the spare (maybe a spare for the sparearanoid: ) and other unforseen items. I'd want to make it hug the roof as much as possible, so that would probably entail custom roof bars.
On other idea was the possiblity of a pull-out/roll-up awning attached to the side of it.
Otherwise I'd have lighting up front and lighting out back. And as mentioned the CB antenna mount. the basket would probably be removed for the majority of the time since it's additions aren't always needed. I would have to say that if either the winch or the basket+ is going on the jeep for some reason, so is the other.
Suspension/Wheels/Tires:
Currently the jeep sits on bone stock suspension, which the front already appears to me to be sagging after only 35k miles. The plan right now is to replace the dampers with new Monroe units (possibly the helper spring rear ones) and install springs for a diesel since they're designed to handle more weight. Also they should give me a smidge of a lift so I can run the tires and wheels I want... MOABs on Goodyear Silent Armor 235/75R16 size.
I think that's all for now. More to follow at some point I can almost guarantee.
I have a goal of modifying my jeep to perform the following tasks...
- Daily Driver duties of hauling the kid/wife/groceries/tools for my job (I.T. guy.)
- Track Day tow truck
- Vehicle recovery during the winter time
- Tree recovery service (don't ask... they keep falling down! :rofl: )
- Plow vehicle for mine and a couple other LOCAL driveways
- Do things in such a way that other future (unknown?) possibilties are (with any luck!) not made more difficult by the changes I make
A couple times a year I do this...
You must be registered for see images
You must be registered for see images
You must be registered for see images
Now currently that's a 20' Bri-Mar full steel deck trailer. that full setup with all my tools and parts in the back of the jeep weighed in at 10,060# recently... a bit portly I'll admit and I'm working on that (mostly in replacing the trailer with one that weighs about 1000# less.)
I want to set things up on the jeep such that I'm not having a difficult time taking things off constantly to keep the weight of the jeep down for "normal" or "mall crawling" duties, but at the same time not spend hours putting stuff back on.
I'm not even sure where to start with my requirements and parts decriptions, so expect this post to be clarified as time goes on. I guess I'll start with the winch first though.
Winch:
used for pulling the car on the trailer if it breaks, standing up trees, pulling vehicles out of ditches, dragging trees up the hill side for conversion into firewood, other possible unknown uses.
currently it's in a 2" receiver bracket, which initially I thought was really good idea. I can stick it on the trailer or attach to the rear of the jeep and eventually to the front. so far I have not bought the front mount receiver hitch for various reasons...
- if I ever went off-roading it'd sit too low and would be very likely to get augered into something. that would be bad.
- the front hitch would conflict with a possible plow mount, as I'm not no longer interested in a hitch mounted plow (just not useful enough.)
now one problem I can see with having the backbone is... can I remove the winch from it so that I'm not carrying it around all the time (like in the summer when it's not needed alot) and can I remove it easily? I have to explore that. anyone who's got a backbone if they could chime in about that I'd appreciate it. I can rather easily solve the electrical aspects of it (already have a source for the needed high current connectors) but the bolting/unbolting from the actual backbone still presents a question.
I've used the winch several times hanging off the rear of the jeep and I've determined the following...
The rear tire needs to be removed if I want the winch directly in the hitch.
Or I need to leave the tailgate door completely open which means it flops around as I'm trying to align the jeep for a pull.
I need to use 24" of extension out of the hitch to make the winch clear the spare tire.
I accomplished the latter one time the problem was it was done with a 12" extension and a 12" step/platform extension, so I had 3 pins that were potential failure points. Not to mention if the pull had been anything off-axis it would have been either impossible or disasterous.
With regards to vehicle recovery onto the trailer, I recognize that whatever changes I make to the trailer (tire rack for example) have to consider the position of the winch and the angle of the line during a pull up.
Towing:
As the pictures show I tow an open car trailer a couple times a year. Hopefully that will actually grow (was actually planning 6 track days this year, but for various reasons most got canceled) both for track days and other purposes. Due to the design of the hitch I installed the receiver is tucked very far up under the jeep. that combined with the short draw bar I have results in me needing to remove the spare tire to even get the tongue on the ball, and the bracket from the door to operate the hand crank for the trailer foot. this obviously leaves me with out a mounted spare on the jeep. while yes I can carry the spare on the trailer (in fact it usually winds up going in the trunk of the car that's on the trailer!) or in the back of the jeep itself, access to the latter is severely compromised by the design of the trailer (jack). Now I am planning on replacing this trailer with a different one and hope to explore these problems in detail with the shop I'll be purchasing it from, but for the time being it's probably safe to say there's not going to be a trailer made such that the tongue jack will be out of the way of the tailgate completely. In addition the back of the jeep is frequently filled with various tools, tents, chairs, spare parts, coolers, luggage, etc. for the event i'm attending, so attempting to package the spare back there and still have easy access to it if needed presents a challenge.
An interesting design option that I observed (zone zero) is to attached an addtional receiver to the hitch, offset to one side. Hopefully the owner of this picture doesn't mind my liberating them.
You must be registered for see images
You must be registered for see images
This idea greatly intrigues me, in that I could create a permanent mounting spot for the spare, design the bracket to be folded down so the tailgate can be opened fully, and free up the weight off the door itself. note my door is bent from the bracket and I suspect the previous owner backed into something, so it would allow me to clean it up.
It would also allow the trailer tongue to mate up without any issues or further efforts... just insert the draw bar and hitch up.
Another quick thought was to see if I could move the spare tire mount more to the driver's side of the door, and still be able to open it fully. If anyone has done or tried that I'd appreciate your commentary.
The other option was to roof mount the spare. While I plan to add a basket up top for other reasons (front and rear lighting, possibly side lighting, luggage carrying, things I don't want IN the jeep, etc.) the prospects of attempting to retreive the spare from the roof do not thrill me, as well as the potential negative impact on the vehicle's roll center. while I don't believe the latter is a terribly great impact, I would like to investigate it. Also does it have a marked negative impact on fuel economy. This this is already a pig to start with, no need to make it more of one at least as much as I can avoid it.
(although to be fair, my mixed driving gets me about 18mpg on regular, while my towing that rig nets me almost 17mpg on premium if I drive nicely.)In the end I do not want to change the receiver position on the hitch if at all possible. the close positioning of the ball to the rear axle makes towing very stable and easy. while yes the trailer will "dance" sometimes I'm more inclined to blame it ON the trailer itself, given that it's been abused over it's life. Repairs I've had to make to it so far include a complete leaf spring assembly, 2 brakes, and it needs 2 tires badly. I also suspect the front axle isn't perfectly straight. hence why I want to get rid of it and get a new one.
Basket/Lighting:
The plan is to put up a Rola roof cargo basket with extension, for the purposes of external item storage, a place to mount lights, CB antenna mount location, the possiblity of the spare (maybe a spare for the spare
aranoid: ) and other unforseen items. I'd want to make it hug the roof as much as possible, so that would probably entail custom roof bars.On other idea was the possiblity of a pull-out/roll-up awning attached to the side of it.
Otherwise I'd have lighting up front and lighting out back. And as mentioned the CB antenna mount. the basket would probably be removed for the majority of the time since it's additions aren't always needed. I would have to say that if either the winch or the basket+ is going on the jeep for some reason, so is the other.
Suspension/Wheels/Tires:
Currently the jeep sits on bone stock suspension, which the front already appears to me to be sagging after only 35k miles. The plan right now is to replace the dampers with new Monroe units (possibly the helper spring rear ones) and install springs for a diesel since they're designed to handle more weight. Also they should give me a smidge of a lift so I can run the tires and wheels I want... MOABs on Goodyear Silent Armor 235/75R16 size.
I think that's all for now. More to follow at some point I can almost guarantee.
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