Slide-out Rack Reinforcement

[jpaeth]

I have been reading the threads about how weak and useless the slide-out rear rack is on the Cougar TTs since i bought mine last fall. I have a Honda Eu3000is genny and had hopes of using this rack to store it. Everyone was telling me to just rip it out and build a whole new rack from scratch. I wont argue that the suggested solution wouldn't be of better quality, but my solution has been working well so far so I though I would share.

What I did was take a strip of 3/8" steel and bend it into a c-bracket that would fit over the top of the factory, horribly undersized, terribly welded angle bracket.
I milled out a hole to accommodate the pin and then I welded the new bracket over the top of the old.
I gave it the standard "jump" test and it felt solid as a rock. When I put my whole weight into it as hard as i could (a solid 230lbs) the was a very slight deflection of the square tubing that makes up the frame, but no real bending.

After 3 trips with the honda genny (125ish lbs wet) and a bunch of firewood over some very bumpy Alaskan roads, i am happy to say that it is holding up perfectly!

Again, I admit that a complete rebuild would no doubt be more solid, but for less than $75 and an afternoon of work I cant complain. That and I keep the slide-out functionality and the factory appearance.

Thanks for taking a look!

[chuckster57]

Looks good! As they say, there's more than one way to skin a cat.