Bumper rack

[markcee]

Curious....do these same cautions apply to the factory installed receiver? Mine is rated at 300 lb capacity per Keystone and was considering adding a modest cargo carrier to increase storage.

[QCMan]

Hi. Your receiver has a factory rating that indicates some amount of confidence that it is built to handle the rated 300 pounds. Bumpers have no stated rating which indicates there is no confidence in it carrying anything. Look under your unit and you will see that the receiver is attached to the frame and not the bumper. Use it with confidence for anything up to its rating.

[Kwaidonjin]

I saw where the 2020 Outbacks had a built on rear storage. But mine didn't come with it. Can you add this to current models?

[RVGator]

Has anybody had a welding shop weld on a 2” receiver to the frame and avoid all the questions with the bumper?

[Sarge2]

My son is a Heavy truck repair tech and is an excellent fabricator. We just discussed adding an actual hitch to the rear of my Passport. The actual bumper mounts are two 3/16th Steel plates that are sandwiched on the actual frame rail on both sides. This leaves about a 3/16" to 1/4" gap between the bumper mounting brackets ... My bumper is welded (quite well I must say) from the factory to both of these sandwiched plates.
My issue isn't so much with the bumper mounting brackets as it is with the thin wall tubing used to make the actual bumper... I wouldn't attach anything to that even though it is welded... an actual hitch would be considerably long to go from frame rail to frame rail leaving a large area unsupported in the middle... so without dropping the coroplast cover to see where the other nearest cross member is, I'd be hesitant to add one running from frame rail to frame rail only.. even if I was only going to haul a couple of bikes...

[Canonman]

Originally Posted by RVGator

Has anybody had a welding shop weld on a 2” receiver to the frame and avoid all the questions with the bumper?

We had this done to a previous TT. They had it done same day at a cost of about $400 total. There are receiver hitches you an buy that will bolt on to the frame as well.

[Bandit12]

We just bought and took delivery of a 2021 Cougar Half Ton 27SABWE. It comes from the factory with a 2 inch receiver welded to the frame and rated for 300 lbs. I'm ordering a rack at work on Tues. I plan on putting my generator on that and maybe, if it will fit, my Yeti cooler. The rack measures 60x19.5 and its rated for 500 lbs. I know my generator weighs in at about 100. It will be so much easier to lift the generator to that rack instead of into the bed of my truck.

[JRTJH]

Originally Posted by Bandit12

We just bought and took delivery of a 2021 Cougar Half Ton 27SABWE. It comes from the factory with a 2 inch receiver welded to the frame and rated for 300 lbs. I'm ordering a rack at work on Tues. I plan on putting my generator on that and maybe, if it will fit, my Yeti cooler. The rack measures 60x19.5 and its rated for 500 lbs. I know my generator weighs in at about 100. It will be so much easier to lift the generator to that rack instead of into the bed of my truck.

Keep a VERY CAREFUL EYE on the welds for your receiver. It is "rated for a maximum of 300 pounds" (at the receiver head)... You're going to be extending a rack 19.5+ inches behind the point of the rating. Think about the "lever effect" a 100 pound generator will place on the receiver as it "literally bounces up and down in the roughest part of your entire trailer frame".... You may go 50K miles before you develop cracks in the attachment points or you may go 50 miles before you see damage... But, eventually, you're going to see issues with metal fatigue and/or damaged welds with that kind of weight being placed 20+" behind the receiver head and more like 30-40 inches behind where the receiver is welded to the frame.