Glend wrote:
And Eric I have been thinking about fabbing up a hitch mount carrier as well. I want something that could carry a jerry and a second spare tyre (desert trip dreaming I am).
Desert trip - yeah! Last year me and the missus went to central Oz and the KJ was PACKED!
The cargo area had 20L diesel, 80Lwater... etc.
I had a good look at the offerings from kaymar and have even considered buying a s/h one on ebay and pirating various bits and pieces off it.
The fiddly things like latches, strikers, arms, jerryholders etc would be too time consuming for me to muck around with.
The cradle i have in mind to fab would be bolted up with the stock 6 tow hitch bolts.
On each side a length of approx 50x50 RHS would protrude rearwards (through a cut-out in the bumper) and a cross member would join the two.
Overall a squared u-shape and the cross member slightly protruding behind the rear bumper. (but well within the limits of the rear tyre).
My focus is mainly for a rear hi-lift jacking location (for recovery purposes only) and to carry two water jerries.
I carry a second spare tyre carcass only - and it goes on the roof. I don't reckon that the KJ has sufficient width to carry two tyres side-by-side.
Two jerries, mounted longitudinally either side of the central spare wheel also fouls the ADR field of view requirements for the rear lamps - so will also have to incorporate those LED type ones into the cross member.
Shoulda seen the look on the wife's face when she saw me rip all the plastic bumpers/flares off the back of the KJ.
"I'm only giong to cut it here and here.. and stick that metal in here..." LOL