Project Tow Hook ..... or mitigating a $28,000 worry

[21st Century Pony]

First, I'll remind everyone that a tow hitch is never meant for recovery use. Towing your vehicle out of the ditch or up onto a flatbed truck via the hitch is dangerous and wrong. Recovery forces when the vehicle is stuck far exceed the weight of the vehicle (2-3x) and the rating of a trailer hitch. You cannot tow a 5000 lb vehicle onto a flatbed with a hitch rated for 3500 pounds.



Do you have a topic on the euro hitch install? How is it adapted to tow US trailers with safety chains?

And sorry to be a pain, but I think that front recovery hook is going to bend or tear the aluminum crash bar if it's ever used. Nobody has done an engineering analysis on that to see if the aluminum is thick enough.
[/QUOT

First, I'll remind everyone that a tow hitch is never meant for recovery use. Towing your vehicle out of the ditch or up onto a flatbed truck via the hitch is dangerous and wrong. Recovery forces when the vehicle is stuck far exceed the weight of the vehicle (2-3x) and the rating of a trailer hitch. You cannot tow a 5000 lb vehicle onto a flatbed with a hitch rated for 3500 pounds.



Do you have a topic on the euro hitch install? How is it adapted to tow US trailers with safety chains?

And sorry to be a pain, but I think that front recovery hook is going to bend or tear the aluminum crash bar if it's ever used. Nobody has done an engineering analysis on that to see if the aluminum is thick enough.

Lee,

You raised several points, so this will have several sections. I appreciate your interest.

I have electronic and paper installation instructions for the Ford Euro hitch. I intend to but haven't yet made a DIY... when I do, these instructions will of course be within the DIY. This project is a hobby project, one of several, and life tends to get in the way.

Your points are of course valid... I well understand the high weight of the Mach E compared to a normal gasoline car, as I had already folded a neighbor's Crown Victoria jack (see 1st attached pic) last Summer while playing with the wheels. This car is far heavier than it might feel to the driver.

My phrase of potentially towing the Mach E out of a ditch backwards is of course very imprecise, as it depends on immediate conditions present. Towing out of a deep 60 degree ditch is different than towing out of a gentle 15 degree ditch... towing out of rocks is different than towing out of fluffy snow and towing out of fluffy snow is different than towing out of red Georgia mud... etc. etc. Towing a dead car with blown high voltage contactors out of a garage is different still. Nonetheless, having options is different than having no options, right?

This of course applies to any tow hitch, OEM or not.

About your question whether the Ford Euro hitch is adapted to U.S. safety chains: I only noticed after I had installed my Ford Euro hitch, but yes (after our discussion in the other thread on the same subject). The heavy steel receiver for the swan neck does have an oblong anchor point milled into it on its left side, for a secondary safety attachment (see the 2d picture). Because it's not a double loop like our chain attachment points, it took me a bit to notice this and think it through.

About the front tow ring: your thoughts were my thoughts as well when I was installing it and noticed the aluminum vs. steel front bumper construction. I decided to continue and finish the job because the Rennsport backing plate has a decent contact area to spread the load, and because the attachment point directly behind the access cover is in line and pretty much centered on the car's passenger frame rail which will take a lot of the load, and because I noticed there is a horizontal front-to-back wall (web?) inside the middle of the entire aluminum bumper which ties the front wall and the rear wall of the bumper together, so the pull of the tow ring is more reliably transferred to the said car frame rail behind the bumper... the Rennsport backing plate nestles right up to this centerline horizontal inner wall (I'm sure there is a technical name for it which escapes me now) from its underside. I actually thought of adding a long steel backing plate to the Rennsport backing plate to make the backing plate's length 2 or three feet, to spread the pulling force more across the bumper... and decided I was overthinking it.

Of course, the European Mach Es have their attachment point right there in the same spot in this bumper, so unless their bumper is steel IMHO it might well be "good enough", right? Besides, for towing something with free-spinning wheels, the towed vehicle's actual weight and its rolling weight (if that is the correct term here) are not the same. Even uphill onto a flatbed. Again, having a choice when it is needed is IMHO better than not having a choice.

The salient point is that all these things, when we prepare for a disabled car, are dangerous operations, even if done routinely by trained workers. So, additional equipment may often mitigate but does not eliminate the danger. Mitigation is a good thing as long as it's not taken as a guarantee of anything. Right? I mean.... we still have life preservers under our seats on all cross-ocean flights, not that I ever want to use one during a flight. Yet it's nice to have that option.

Thanks,

 

[RickMachE]

First, I'll remind everyone that a tow hitch is never meant for recovery use. Towing your vehicle out of the ditch or up onto a flatbed truck via the hitch is dangerous and wrong. Recovery forces when the vehicle is stuck far exceed the weight of the vehicle (2-3x) and the rating of a trailer hitch. You cannot tow a 5000 lb vehicle onto a flatbed with a hitch rated for 3500 pounds.



Do you have a topic on the euro hitch install? How is it adapted to tow US trailers with safety chains?

And sorry to be a pain, but I think that front recovery hook is going to bend or tear the aluminum crash bar if it's ever used. Nobody has done an engineering analysis on that to see if the aluminum is thick enough.

Ditto.

 

[AZBill]

My car was bricked at my house, unable to get into tow mode, and had to be pulled out from the rear since it was parked forward facing a block wall. I requested a wheel lift tow truck and they were able to get it without any damage. Ended up towing it to the dealer on a dolly, rather than a flatbed.

 

[scoopman]

Lee,

You raised several points, so this will have several sections. I appreciate your interest.

I have electronic and paper installation instructions for the Ford Euro hitch. I intend to but haven't yet made a DIY... when I do, these instructions will of course be within the DIY. This project is a hobby project, one of several, and life tends to get in the way.

Your points are of course valid... I well understand the high weight of the Mach E compared to a normal gasoline car, as I had already folded a neighbor's Crown Victoria jack (see 1st attached pic) last Summer while playing with the wheels. This car is far heavier than it might feel to the driver.

My phrase of potentially towing the Mach E out of a ditch backwards is of course very imprecise, as it depends on immediate conditions present. Towing out of a deep 60 degree ditch is different than towing out of a gentle 15 degree ditch... towing out of rocks is different than towing out of fluffy snow and towing out of fluffy snow is different than towing out of red Georgia mud... etc. etc. Towing a dead car with blown high voltage contactors out of a garage is different still. Nonetheless, having options is different than having no options, right?

This of course applies to any tow hitch, OEM or not.

About your question whether the Ford Euro hitch is adapted to U.S. safety chains: I only noticed after I had installed my Ford Euro hitch, but yes (after our discussion in the other thread on the same subject). The heavy steel receiver for the swan neck does have an oblong anchor point milled into it on its left side, for a secondary safety attachment (see the 2d picture). Because it's not a double loop like our chain attachment points, it took me a bit to notice this and think it through.

About the front tow ring: your thoughts were my thoughts as well when I was installing it and noticed the aluminum vs. steel front bumper construction. I decided to continue and finish the job because the Rennsport backing plate has a decent contact area to spread the load, and because the attachment point directly behind the access cover is in line and pretty much centered on the car's passenger frame rail which will take a lot of the load, and because I noticed there is a horizontal front-to-back wall (web?) inside the middle of the entire aluminum bumper which ties the front wall and the rear wall of the bumper together, so the pull of the tow ring is more reliably transferred to the said car frame rail behind the bumper... the Rennsport backing plate nestles right up to this centerline horizontal inner wall (I'm sure there is a technical name for it which escapes me now) from its underside. I actually thought of adding a long steel backing plate to the Rennsport backing plate to make the backing plate's length 2 or three feet, to spread the pulling force more across the bumper... and decided I was overthinking it.

Of course, the European Mach Es have their attachment point right there in the same spot in this bumper, so unless their bumper is steel IMHO it might well be "good enough", right? Besides, for towing something with free-spinning wheels, the towed vehicle's actual weight and its rolling weight (if that is the correct term here) are not the same. Even uphill onto a flatbed. Again, having a choice when it is needed is IMHO better than not having a choice.

The salient point is that all these things, when we prepare for a disabled car, are dangerous operations, even if done routinely by trained workers. So, additional equipment may often mitigate but does not eliminate the danger. Mitigation is a good thing as long as it's not taken as a guarantee of anything. Right? I mean.... we still have life preservers under our seats on all cross-ocean flights, not that I ever want to use one during a flight. Yet it's nice to have that option.

Thanks,

I only would use my rear hitch in the case of zombie attack or additional HVBJBJBJBJB failure, in the later case it would be a one-way trip to getting sold somewhere. Both of these events seem very unlikely, but as others have said, it's good to have more options than less.

In the meanwhile, being able to lug bikes occasionally is great, and I think the investment was worth it for me for that primary function alone.

 

[dtbaker61]

Hey Andy. I've seen some chatter on this topic before, pulling a mach-e from a rear hitch.

If I remember correctly the concern was that of the hitch is rated to pull less than the mach-e, and in some cases 3000 lbs less, how confident can we be that this wouldn't cause an insane amount of damage if the hitch failed while pulling the car out of a ditch for example?

pulling on a hitch fastened to high strength frame rails with 4 big fat bolts that are fastened to a chassis member to take crash loads (at multiple G), worries me less than having a tow truck yank on anything else, like a wheel or control arm, from the back.

Pulling a vehicle out of a snowbank, or a ditch, or up a truck ramp rarely requires more than a couple hundred pounds of pull....

 

[21st Century Pony]

I just installed a rear tow capability on my Mach E.

Disclaimer: this solution will not work for everyone. For starters, it depends on having an additional, Ford-approved, optional kit already rigged onto the Mach E. However, knowledge is free unless withheld, so here's what I did.

Why: the potential of the car bricking itself, either because of the high voltage battery failure or for another reason, is a possibility I wanted to mitigate. My car has the original high voltage battery... so far, so good, but...

Additionally, I have been stuck, usually but not always in snow, and I have seen others stuck, in snow, or mud like the OP in this post. The point I've learned is that no one plans to get stuck... yet things happen to good people.

So I chose a 1 ton-rated galvanized shackle at our local hardware store whose shank is just the right fit for the safety hole in my Ford Europe towing kit.

For visibility and somewhat for corrosion protection, I had it powder-coated.

Easy to see, easy to locate... plus it now serves as an easy-to-engage secondary anchor point for safety chains while towing.

 

[dtbaker61]

I just installed a rear tow capability on my Mach E.

Disclaimer: this solution will not work for everyone. For starters, it depends on having an additional, Ford-approved, optional kit already rigged onto the Mach E. However, knowledge is free unless withheld, so here's what I did.

Why: the potential of the car bricking itself, either because of the high voltage battery failure or for another reason, is a possibility I wanted to mitigate. My car has the original high voltage battery... so far, so good, but...

Additionally, I have been stuck, usually but not always in snow, and I have seen others stuck, in snow, or mud like the OP in this post. The point I've learned is that no one plans to get stuck... yet things happen to good people.

So I chose a 1 ton-rated galvanized shackle at our local hardware store whose shank is just the right fit for the safety hole in my Ford Europe towing kit.

For visibility and somewhat for corrosion protection, I had it powder-coated.

Easy to see, easy to locate... plus it now serves as an easy-to-engage secondary anchor point for safety chains while towing.

nice.... but why not just go with hitch receiver and enable bike rack, etc ?

 

[21st Century Pony]

nice.... but why not just go with hitch receiver and enable bike rack, etc ?

Because, in my car's case, the hitch receiver is a European detachable swan neck + ball which lives in its bag under the floor of the trunk unless I am towing something. Its receiver is a very heavy-duty vertical shaft protectively closed off by that black square cap you see next to the red shackle.

This now-red shackle, unlike the removable tow ball, is visibly and permanently obvious to anyone who might get the car stuck or immobile, even if its not me... a nephew or my Sonny Boy or even the eventual next owner.

Besides, I like the local powder coater and do throw him business when I can.

 

[SWO]

I found these aviation "No Lift" stickers for my battery rails. They're printed on aluminum foil and obviously made to withstand the elements. I was hoping that they would be tall enough to wrap underneath and serve as a witness if a lift pad was placed on them but they fit with plenty of room.

No affiliation but here's where I got mine:

https://www.wicksaircraft.com/shop/no-lift-push-step-soft-aluminum-peel-off/

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