Yes to common sense, a tow bar in a honker is a thing strongly useful and desirable. There are sometimes small problems with it. Honker is, as you know, a tall car and mounting the hook at the right height is a challenge. I, in my 2000 Honker, had a classic factory hitch mounted with a ball hitch. I have it stamped in the registration certificate, of course.
The problem here is that while it does not interfere with off-road driving, because it is high, it is difficult to fasten a classic trailer to it, because the ball is at a height of 57 cm, which causes the trailer to scrub the ground with its back.
There are other solutions where the hook is lower, but then in the field it acts as a plow.
In my opinion, the solution here may be to use the so-called US 2″ adapter.
In the US there is a completely different standard when it comes to tow hooks. If cars with this solution come to Europe then they must use these adapters.
The advantage is the variety of these adapters and the many different possible applications. To use such an adapter in the Honker, you need a suitable socket into which this adapter can be plugged.
You can buy such a socket without a problem, only you need to pay attention to the spacing of the screws. On the Honker 2000, it is 83×56 mm. Such adapters, of course, of the correct manufacturer have European approval, which means that they can be used throughout the Union.
When purchasing, please pay attention to this.
Once we have a socket, we need the aforementioned adapter. And here, too, there are different versions and variations depending on your needs. In my case, I used the -115 mm adapter, which means that it lowers the height of the ball by this amount.
After unpacking the shipment, it looks like this:
Assembling the whole thing is trivial, because you only need to unscrew and screw 4 screws, and the effect is as shown in the photo.
After attaching the adapter, which takes from 5 seconds, you can fasten the trailer.
We have the center of the sphere at a height of a little less than 42 cm, which is the upper acceptable limit for the European standard.
We mount it only when it is needed, which makes it unobtrusive in the field.
Of course, in addition to the ball adapter, we can use many other different adapters. From luggage platform to bike racks to hammock mounts, etc., etc., etc.
The cost of the entire set I presented here was 611 PN for me.
I hope you have something to think about, or not 🙂
Author: Grzegorz Siwiec
Publication date: August 24, 2023
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