JK TowBar - no were near fitting

[Mark-J]

Why is it that everything you buy now for buses doesn't fit without butchering it? I bought a JK towbar, Watling engineering one, second hand a few months ago and just getting round to fitting it.

http://forum.earlybay.com/viewtopic...&sid=73d986ba9a1cb11729b679edf06c544e#p468332

How is this meant to fit a standard bus? Where to start, the drop arms foul the bumper brackets and I can't see these bolts tightening up without me making a spacer to put behind the mounting plates. Then the main cross beam at the bottom fouls the exhaust support bracket, so I'm going to have to grind the bottom of that off too.

Has anybody else had any joy with these? I can't believe they're made to be so tight, I mean, it's a standard bus, with a standard exhaust, and there's no way these drop arms are built to fit without problems.

I'm thinking of just scrapping it and getting an original, ggggrrrrrr

Mark

 

[RICH-I-AM]

Yep. I had to notch my bumper irons.
Then I just loose fitted the whole thing and then just tightened the whole thing.
Have you tried flipping the cross beam? Maybe thats the problem?

Rich

 

[StuF]

Can't comment on the JK towbar but the gadget one I have installed went straight on with no adaptation. VS exhaust fits perfectly with it in place too

 

[Mark-J]

no the cross beam only goes on one way. Really don't want to notch the bumper irons, don't mind about the exhaust bracket but if you're designing something like this don't you think that they've have given you some flexibility, this is all just too close. I have the one year only rear valance too so only 1 bolt each side, you think it's still worth fitting that bit?

 

[wanderlust]

Had a few issues fitting mine. Found that if it's all made up first then fitted to the van it does fit but is very tight. If you try to build it in stages on the van then it will not fit.

 

[hogseye]

That's the trouble with JK stuff, 9 times out of 10 it don't fit!!

 

[jonboylaw]

Gadgets bar, fitted well, no problems at all.


Sent from my GX64 SatCom phone using Tapatalk

 

[martin.sim]

Is he doing any more ?


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Why didn't I buy my bus years ago !?

 

[Mark-J]

well got it to fit in the end. Had to grind a notch in the exhaust tail pipe bracket and also make a spacer to sit behind the drop arm and the chassis to space it past the bumper iron on the side with the extra tow hitch loops. I also sprayed the support angle iron that bolts to the rear valance so that now you really don't notice it.