Can you add a swing hitch later?

We will need to take photos to post them, so maybe this weekend when we have it out of the garage for some preparation for a June trip we'll try and take some photos and real measurements. My recollection is that with the hitch removed it is very close to flush with the body of the front shell, and that it fits pretty close to dead even with a column in our garage, which makes it very close to 21' long to the rear-most part of the back bumper. But I'll take some measurements to get more precise. The modification puts the propane tanks out on the "swinging" part of the hitch, and because of the tank mount hardware you cannot fully swing the hitch even with the propane tanks removed, so I just remove the whole thing from the front and sit it on it's side beside the trailer in the garage.

When the Car Show came to the Denver RV show a couple of months ago, they had examples of both the factory swing hitch as well as their own modification. They claimed they've been making this modification with this particular welding shop for years without issue, but I personally will be monitoring the joints for cracks like the rash of posts on this forum from 2006 regarding the factory swing hitch. We decided to go for it because it allows us to stuff the 3124 in our garage; we'd previously thought only the 3023 was a possibility. With 3 kids, the extra storage is really attractive.

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Update: I still need to get the pictures of the hitch uploaded, but I took some measurements, and the overall length of the 3124KB with the hitch removed is 20' 6". The hitch looks like it was cut 43" back from the tip and then a 2" C-channel was added to box off the removable tongue, so it winds up 45" long.

We have more pictures we hope to get up on the tmphotos.org site but these few pictures should give the idea.

I have the factory swing tongue. This has a shorter swing section. The difference is that my batteries and propane tanks are still on the trailer. The pivot point is just in font of the tanks.

I only needed about 8 inches, so this design is better for me at this time. I can see that if you really need to shorten it up that moving the pivot point further back would be an advantage.

Yeah, to me the big disadvantage of our modification is that I need to completely remove the tongue rather than just simply swing it - it's way to big and the tray for the propane tank gets in the way of the front shell. So if you don't need this much reduction in length, the factory swing hitch has some advantages.

[Bill]

Mark -

What if you put the dolly wheel on the tongue jack? Could you swing it then?

By the way, it doesn't look like the Car Show mod would work on a 2720 SL with horizontal tanks. Would it?

Bill

Hi Bill,

Yes and no, the hitch will swing either way actually since it's pinned with a hinge on both sides. But with the propane tanks on the swinging part of the hitch, and with the frame cut way back even with the leading edge of the front shell, the propane tanks bump into the top shell before the swinging hitch swings all the way around. If I take the propane tanks off, I still have the threaded rod in the way that holds propane tanks in place, although I've thought about finding a way to make this easily removable.

This was my choice by the way. I asked them to make the frame cut as far back as they could so that I can jam the thing into my garage - it's absolutely amazing to me that I can fit a 31 ft travel trailer into my existing garage. By pushing the hinge so far back towards the front shell, the propane tanks have to be up on the swinging section by the ball mount, which is different than how TM sets the swinging hitch up. I think they did a good job of this, including adding a quick releases and disconnects on the brake release and the propane line so that the hitch can be fully disconnected.

So what could they do with a 2720SL? I dunno, but they have their own welding shop so they can pretty much do anything that makes engineering sense. Your tanks are horizontal and up under the front shell right? That tells me that your hinge would be in front of the propane tanks no matter what, so you won't have anything in the way when you swing the hitch, and they won't have to mess with the plumbing of the gas lines. It sounds like it would work pretty well, but I don't have a 2720SL in front of me so maybe there's something I'm missing.

p.s. a quick edit after looking at the second photo above - it looks like the jack for the trailer wheel might be the thing to watch and see if you can keep if from bumping into the front shell. I'm not sure how far back you can make the hinge and still have it not get in the way (unless there's another way to do that that doesn't stick up like a flag-pole). In my picture, you can see the tray for the propane tanks along with the threaded rod holding the propane tank mounting hardware - that is what gets in my way first.

Mark

[Bill]

Not sure if it would help at all, but that threaded rod could be cut WAY back. I cut mine when it got in the way of something.

Bill

Ours was the factory version and came with our TM. It gives only 2' less storage length on our 2720 (20' 3" to 18' 3"), don't know if longer models are different. It swings on pins on either side. Depending on which pin is removed, the swing can be either right or left. Or with both pins out it can be completely removed. It seems to be a particularly useful feature, especially for garage storage.

Originally Posted by markandanne

...

When the Car Show came to the Denver RV show a couple of months ago, they had examples of both the factory swing hitch as well as their own modification. They claimed they've been making this modification with this particular welding shop for years without issue, but I personally will be monitoring the joints for cracks like the rash of posts on this forum from 2006 regarding the factory swing hitch. We decided to go for it because it allows us to stuff the 3124 in our garage; we'd previously thought only the 3023 was a possibility. With 3 kids, the extra storage is really attractive.
...

That doesn't look much like the swing hitch the Car Show did on my 2720SL. Mine is about two feet back (same distance as web site specs), and is in front of the propane tanks (it does actually swing, though). From what I could tell, the big difference in the Car Show mod compared to the factory is the extra bolts they put through the facing plates to eliminate the wobble in the pins -- a little more trouble to swing, but I feel much more secure about it.

After three years it's still showing no signs of problems.

Originally Posted by Bill

Mark -

What if you put the dolly wheel on the tongue jack? Could you swing it then?

By the way, it doesn't look like the Car Show mod would work on a 2720 SL with horizontal tanks. Would it?

Bill

Actually, I've had it on my 2720SL since new, May 2006. It's holding up well, to this point. And the Car Show mod is stronger (when towing) and, from reports, tows more stably than the factory swing hitch, since the face plates are bolted, as well as pinned.