Podmods, Maintenance, Tips and Tricks : WDH hitch and unibody frame concern and questions.

Author: JET
Subject: WDH hitch and unibody frame concern and questions.
Posted: 04 Feb 2017 at 7:15pm

Originally posted by JET I am wondering if there is any reason why I can't drive the Highlander towing the Rpod and see how it does without the WDH torsion bars/chains attached. Maybe someone can answer these 2 questions for me.  1) Is there any reason why using the setup without the WDH bars and chains attached would be a problem? That is use the WDH ball mount only (it is quite a bit larger and different, has angle adjustments etc)/ 2) I also have the Husky friction sway bar. Is there any reason why I couldn't use the friction sway bar only? (sway bar only,  but not the torsion bar/chain part of it). So in essence the two above questions are basically asking if I want to try towing the Rpod utilizing the Husky WDH ball mount, leaving the WDH bar/chains off, but attach the friction sway bar, would that cause any problems?

Thanks Stephen for the comments. Today as a experiment I took the Highlander and RPod out and towed the Pod about 10 miles without the WDH or the sway bar attached just to see how it did. I got up to 70, but drove 65 and all felt fine. I could tell that the front end was a little higher, but it didn't feel that bad. I then pulled into a empty parking lot and measured the distance between the front and rear wheel well opening height to the pavement with and without the RPod attached. My unscientific measurements show that with the Rpod attached...the rear dropped 1 1/2 inch and the front raised 1/2 inch from where they are without the pod.