2nd Gen R59 Roadster Most liked posts in thread: R59 hitch receiver project

Okay the hitch receiver is on the roadster tonight but I couldn't finish because I didn't have what I needed on hand to cut the bumper metal which is quite thick, and I didn't want to wake my neighbor's kid :razz:, so I'll have to remove the external bumper again... at least the next time will be faster now that I know what to do.

And boy those plastic snaps drove me crazy . I have 3 to replace now...

I also decided to keep the foam liner instead of disregarding it. I simply cut it with a wood saw. It was easy and keeps some of the electronic component where they where

I was also very happy that the formed steel plate to remove is heavy enough that the hitch receiver isn't that much more weight added. Yeah!!!!
I'm going to weight it later to see what is my added weight from the hitch install.

Here's a few:

 

first time dealing with them . . . so far so good

 

He IS easy to work with which helps greatly. I'll get a return label as well and I'll be doing a direct swap (meaning he is sending it to me before I return the defective one). That will avoid me having to remove the bumper for the 4th time!

 

Okay, so I got the new hitch receiver today. Much better than the first one.
The install of the hitch receiver is now complete and it's great!

To top it off, and as planned, I fully concealed it cutting out the bumper just so when my custom cap is on you could not tell it is modified :biggrin5:





I used some REN shape material and some special SEM epoxy I had on hand





And here is the comparison between the crooked hitch receiver and the new one. It actually worse than it looks on this photograph




Now I've started to work on the project itself by placing pieces in CAD

 

I went with outmotoring aka minidomore mostly because the hitch receiver is completely hidden and I want this thing completely hidden when not in use!

not cheap I must say considering how simple it is... oh well.

 

Yes indeed. I've been exchanging a few emails with him. He was quite helpful and responsive

 

I'm not sure I actually explained what the project is on here much just yet... so here it goes:

I'm installing a hitch receiver for two reasons:
- The primary one is to mount a spare tire on the rear of the car for long road strips.
- The second reason is more of an after though. It's to carry some bikes occasionally.

My original plan was to custom everything but as I was not sure what structural aspect of the car i could use to rely on a strong setup, finding ways to mount any contraption to the frame was slowing me down on this project. I think getting the hidden hitch will save me a tone of time dealing with that aspect. I'm much more comfortable building something that attaches to the hitch than figuring out how to do it to the frame in a robust way.
I'm a bit of a perfectionist so the plan is for a supper clean setup!

Some objective of mine for this project:
- All hidden. All should be seamless and hidden away when not in use. I won't use a cap but rather carefully cut the bumper cover honeycomb pattern in key locations and use it as a cap that will be held by the hitch receiver.
- Get the spare tire close to the boot, unlike any other setup that seats far out. The challenge will be to make sure no vibrations allows the setup to touch the car body.
- Create some sort of cover to make it look fancy and well integrated. I'm not sure on the materials yet for that (soft vs hard).
- Make the design so it doesn't hurt the car overall look.
- Be able to attached the wheel with the flat back on it. It's nice to take a spare with us but one cannot forget the wheel with the flat needs to be brought back
- Be able to easily relocate the license plate (kind of a must :wink.
- Last but not least, be able to move the spare aside to access the inside of the boot as fast as possible.

It's a tall order but we'll see

 

Well I just finished mounted the hitch but of course I didn't noticed that the thing looks crooked. I'm concerned everything I'm going to mount to it is going to look crooked and really bad! What do you guys think?

 

Okay, so despite the crooked hitch receiver I mentioned in my previous post I've started taking measurements for the project today. The intent being to create a some initial diminutional prototype.