Vehicle & Technical > Defender

Front recovery points

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drmike:
Cripes you guys make this sound complicated and expensive. For most purposes fitting a tow ball to the bumper where it's mounted to the chassis is perfectly adequate. If the bumper is sound and you use a good spreader plate you'll be unlucky to need more.

I've yet to see a bumper bend or a properly mounted (or indeed any) tow ball fail for recovery in any circumstances.

The other bonus is that you can almost always get to the tow ball while jate rings and steering guards can be well hidden in mud.

Mike

Eeyore:
:shock:  NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!

Please don't bolt a tow ball to the bumper - it really isn't designed for that kinda load. It'll do for towing but it WILL rip out under heavy loads.

As has been said, the military support the use of jates, and only use the heavily reinforced bumper and pin ofr moving trailers and the like, not recovery. Whilst the military bumper on the racer is ok for towing under the MSA, any heavy recovery would use substantial parts of the vehicle instead.

Be cautious of steering guards with built in recovery points - some of 'em ain't as structural as they could be, too.

Cheers
 8)
Eeyore

kizz81:
use them jate ring things or steering guard, for this week i have herd to many storeys about tow balls being ripped out and almost killing the driver or passnger of the vehicle unlucky enough to be recovering it.

cheers kieran

stageonesimmo:
The military DO NOT recommend the use of JATE rings for recovery - they are not called lashing/lifting eyes for nothing!  

From a purely physics point of view a steering guard bolted on in more than one place each side is still stronger then a JATE ring which in reality is exerting the weight of the pull through 2 thicknesses of chassis steel per side, a guard with only 2 bolts is doubling that.........

Plus, although you shouldn't, I've pulled 110 WOLFs out of some tricky spots on just the bumper and I've never bent one! (just a shame the paint falls off like old folk fall over and the bits outside of the middle are weaker than the door skins :shock:  ...  Ho hum, cant have it all eh?)  :wink:

drmike:
Eeyore I have the greatest respect for you but I have never seen a properly fitted tow ball fail nor a sound bumper bend if the tow ball was placed at the end of the chassis.

I've seen an axle ripped off during a recovery via a tow ball.

If you start really high speed snatch recovery using any recovery point you're asking for trouble but I don't think anyone is suggesting that's any sort of plan.

As far as I know MSA is happy with tow balls as recovery points - at least I have never failed scrutineering at any event on that account. Indeed I'm not sure MSA accepts jate rings, I'll take a look at the Blue Book later on.

I'm all for safety but the original post just wanted to know what a sensible front recovery point was and a tow ball fitted with a good spreader plate on a sound bumper is sensible - well IMHO it is.

Now I think of it I can't think of any steering guard I've seen that doesn't have a fairly sharp edge to its so called recovery points or require the use of shackles which the world and his dog seem to disapprove of.

If you're so stuuck you rip off a decently fitted tow ball then boy you're in trouble.

I now await lots of tales of exactly that happening!

Mike

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