Ball mount/hitch plate for 40,000 lb. hitch?

[Bob86ZZ4]

Hi again. I have one of those 40,000 lb. hitches on my truck conversion. The ball is welded on a plate type of arrangement that fits between two vertical plates on the hitch. You can move the hitch ball plate up or down to the desired height and then insert a large pin across it to lock it in place. Anybody know where to get one of these plate/ball mount things? I'd like to get one without a ball so I can attach a 2" ball for my boat trailer. I need the 2 5/16" for my car hauler so don't want to butcher the one I've got. I tried searching around the googles to no avail. I even searched the web site of one of our sponsors/advertisers here to no avail. Thanks.

[brokenup]

http://www.888saybecks.com/index.php
I bought my United Specialties here and they stock them there. I bought a 2 inch receiver style so I could tow the jeep or suburban. Congrats on the new rig, we love ours!

[Eric B]

I don't know where to get one but why not just change the receiver on the boat trailer?

[Bob86ZZ4]

Well, I could do that. But I also have two utilit trailers with 2" balls needed. And lots of people have trailers that need a 2" ball. So, I think it would be best if I could pull anything with a 2" too.

[Bob E]

Suggest weld a receiver tube under flat on your existing 40K pound hitch, then you can put any sized ball in it that you want by just changing out the stinger/ball assembly. When using the 2&5/16" - remove the stinger.

[geofkaye]

....or turn over the existing and weld a 2" ball on the underside...cheaper and easier.....there is NO HEAT TREATMENT INVOLVED....geofkaye

[Eric B]

makes since so as not to limit yourself

[Bob86ZZ4]

Now I like Bob E's idea. The only problem there is the big huge nut on the underside of the ball. It sticks down lower than the side rails of the on the sides of the mount. I'd have to weld some flat steel across the rails forward of the nut to build up a surface high (or low depending how you look at it) enough to provide a good weld surface to stick a receiver tube onto. Looks like I'd need about 1/4" at least. My neighbor is a retired iron worker and does welding projects to pass the time. I'm going to run it by him and see what he thinks. Might be a good project. Probably a lot cheaper that buying a whole extra mount. That mount looks pretty expensive. How come there are two pins on my hitch. Looks like I only need one. Is the other one to hook the chains around or something?

[Camping Dutchman]

we had the receiver welded on and then we just inserted what we needed at the time, especially helpful when we used a blue ox setup.

[Bob86ZZ4]

You can't weld a 2" tube receiver onto mine because the 2 5/16" ball is bolted through it and then welded on. I think what I'm going to do is have my neighbor fabricate another one and we won't put a ball on that but weld a receiver tube onto it so I can use any insert, including my bike rack that slides into a 2" receiver tube, on it. I like this idea best of all because then I can probably tow the trailer on the 2 5/16" one and put the other one above it and put the bike rack on, maybe, if they both fit. We'll see.

[Bob86ZZ4]

Here's the hitch plate my neighbor made for me. I think it looks great. He used 1/2" plate to fab it up. I bought the 2" i/d square tube at U-Haul for about $18 or so.

[Bob86ZZ4]

And here's the original hitch that came on the truck:



I had him make the receiver a bit smaller because it's not going to be used to haul 40k pounds.

[geofkaye]

....good to have afew friends isn't it BOB?...usually it would be worth maybe $200......geofkaye

[Bob86ZZ4]

Appears my pictures didn't come through. Or they've disappeared due to different hosts or something? Let's see if I can get a picture to post.