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Topic: Trailer Hitches?

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Yodwinder
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Trailer Hitches?
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What do you guys' think is the best brand and why?

Also, front or rear hitch (thinking recovery obviously.)

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aci4369
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Brands of hitches I don't know.  You might try going to some junk yards and picking them up used.  Might save you some money.

I don't know that I would put a hitch on the front of my XJ.  That will hurt your aproach angle in the front. I would just get some tow hooks, might even be cheaper.  This is the set that I got for my old XJ.   Looks like they are even on sale!!

http://motionoffroad.com/catalog/index.php?main_page=product_info&cPath=10_47&products_id=90

At the time when I was looking this was the best tow hook set up on the market.  If you look at the picture they have an extra bracket that goes on the back side of the frame rail to help with support.

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mysticfirexj
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My rear hitch is a class V from Valley that I got from Hires in Fort Wayne for around 100bucks. I am completely satisfied with it.

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89eliminator
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i agree with Andy. dont put a hitch on the front, get a good set of tow hooks (c4x4 ones are perfect).

i had a u-haul class 3 on the back of my truck and it worked good.

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dogwonk
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Ditto on the C4x4's for the front.

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Yodwinder
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I'd wanted to throw some D-Rings up front instead of hooks. I see that C4X4 sells some (scroll to the bottom of the page,) but will these work with the brackets?

Also, when you install the C4X4 brackets you have to remove the front bumper/mounts. I was looking at this kit from motion, which comes with the D-Rings rather than hooks, and you don't have to remove the bumper.

Opinions between the two? Has anyone tried the HiCountry kit?


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dogwonk
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I am not an expert so take this for what it is worth...

The C4x4 tow hooks and d-rings pictured at the bottom of that page are simply that. They are not a "recovery kit" like what you are wanting (at least, what I think you are wanting). You can buy those individually or to go along with a kit, as pictured two and three pictures above that. You would buy the d-rings to go with a shackle mount (which typically goes into your hitch receiver) and you would buy the tow hooks to go with the tow hook brackets.

Is there a reason you are opposed to removing your bumper in order to install tow hooks? My personal opinion is that C4x4's design is a strong one. I don't know anything about the Hi Country set up. It may be equally as strong. Hopefully someone on here can throw in their twocents.gif on that subject.

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Yodwinder
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dogwonk wrote:

I am not an expert so take this for what it is worth...

The C4x4 tow hooks and d-rings pictured at the bottom of that page are simply that. They are not a "recovery kit" like what you are wanting (at least, what I think you are wanting). You can buy those individually or to go along with a kit, as pictured two and three pictures above that. You would buy the d-rings to go with a shackle mount (which typically goes into your hitch receiver) and you would buy the tow hooks to go with the tow hook brackets.

Is there a reason you are opposed to removing your bumper in order to install tow hooks? My personal opinion is that C4x4's design is a strong one. I don't know anything about the Hi Country set up. It may be equally as strong. Hopefully someone on here can throw in their twocents.gif on that subject.


Correct, I know that. I guess what I wanted to know is if it is possible to hook up D-Rings to the C4X4 setup rather than the hooks that come with the brackets.

I see the D-Ring receiver setup quite a few places, but again the problem is going to be that I don't have a hitch setup up front, nor do I want one anymore.

 



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aci4369
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Is there any particular reason that you want D-rings as aposed to hooks?

I'm sure that there are some people on here that can attest to this but if you are getting the d-rings for the looks and will be driving around with them on the XJ you will get tired of them very quick.  They are very noisy, they do look better in my opinion but they just rattle around the hole time and will but the crap out of you.  Every time you stop or start they will smack the mount and bug the crap out of you.

I have no experience with the Hi Country setup, it does have somewhat of a bracket for the back side of the fram rails.  But if you take the pictures for both the setups just look at how the brackets for the C4x4 one are L-brackets.  Those L-brackets allow the setup to tie into more then just the one frame rail that you are mounting it to.  It will actually help re-enforce the front end in my opinion.  It is just a lot sturdier. 

I don't know if they make an adaptor to make it D-rings instead of hooks or not. I don't know that i have seen one.  Hope that helps.

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Yodwinder
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I guess that I thought the general consensus was the everyone preferred D-Rings. I guess that's not the case though.

Noisy D-Rings, problem solved!

-- Edited by Yodwinder at 10:14, 2008-11-23

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LEAD_NOT_FOLLOW
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I know someone who ran those (the Daystar D-ring isolators) and HATED them with a passion. Every time you ever hook up a strap to them and pull on them the stupid things fell off. He eventually zip-tied them to the d-rings so he wouldn't keep loosing them.

Oh and those only work if the bottom of your d-rings is the thing that is "knocking". I've seen many times that the noise is caused not by the bottom knocking but by them shifting in the mount itself as their is play in the d-ring mount itself and the d-ring.

Oh also D-rings are easily stolen if you leave them on your Jeep. I can't tell you how many times I've talked with someone about having their D-rings stolen off thier bumpers. I personally don't leave them out, only pull them out when I need them.

I'm not trying to talk you out of the D-rings by any means, just trying to give you a fair warning that if you had noises while wheeling/driving they get annoying QUICK....

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Yodwinder
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Yeah only having them out is a good idea. Fixes both the noise problem and the stealing problem.

I guess I should contact C4x4 about getting a setup for D-Rings instead of hooks or something.

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Yodwinder
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Also, wrote MO, and they wrote back.


The C4x4 kit comes with tow hooks only. You can however purchase a set of adapter brackets to run a set of d-rings.

We have them available here; http://motionoffroad.com/catalog/index.php?main_page=product_info&cPath=10_47&products_id=370

Those adapters allow you to run a set of d-rings on the C4x4 kit. I will say that the C4x4 kit has a "clip" that is included with the hook that won't allow your tow strap to fall off however. We sell a TON of the C4x4 hooks/brackets and can't say anyone's ever said they'd had an issue with them. We run them on all of our own rigs as well.

-- Edited by Yodwinder at 17:42, 2008-11-23

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