Spare Tire Mount on Boler 13ft

[Rusty99]

Hi everyone,
I have a 1972 13ft boler in rough condition on the exterior. I've been contemplating diving into repairing the exterior fiberglass and doing a paint job but the job seems daunting.

My question for you is regarding the way the spare tire is mounted directly to the back wall all the boler. This seems like it puts unnecessary stress on the firberglass and cause for stress cracks etc.

Has anyone added an A frame or vertical bar the to rear bummer to mount the spare tire to?

If I did this I would patch up the hole in the rear wall and go to town repairing the fiberglass.

Whats your thoughts?

Cheers
Rusty

[Loren G. Hedahl]

I could see the same problem developing with my older Scamp. To keep it from becoming a major issue, I cut a 2 ft piece of 1 x 6 Ash hardwood to be used as a 'backing plate'.

After cutting out the ensolite stuff where the plate was to be mounted, I through-bolted it to the original spare tire bracket and used a generous amount of epoxy to bond the the wood to the fiberglass.

That ended up being a simple, inexpensive solution to avoid further fatigue cracking.

[Ryan P R]

How about just creating a decent looking shim to place on top of the rear bumper that is just the right height to support the spare tire from the bottom? That should take a lot of stress off the back wall, and keep the bouncing to a minimum. I suspect its the bouncing of the spare that causes the high stress levels that's created the cracks.

[GreenHorn]

This is one we made for the back of a Casita. The first one did not have the allthread through the fiberglass when it was sold. The next Casita did, and you can see how they cut and capped off the allthread.

[Loren G. Hedahl]

Ryan -- excellent tip!

Noah -- beautiful bracket design

I must admit the method I used was to glue in (with polyurethane construction glue) a piece of ash hardwood on the inside. One half inch holes were drilled through the ash to the outside of the trailer. Three one half inch allthread was cut to adequate lengths to bolt the wheel/tire assembly to the trailer.

The tire compresses against the trailer body tightly enough to eliminate any movement -- not the best solution as dirt/debris settles between the rubber and fiberglass. I'm sure there is some staining and roughening of the shine and it is impossible to clean that area without removing the wheel/tire.

But the reality is that this is a 30 year old Scamp that has a nice white polyurethane plus clear coat paint job (I'm close to breaking my arm patting myself on the back) but it is certainly not in pristine shape. We have it to use and it is entirely functional to our desires and quite well experienced, thank you!

[Roy in TO]

JEAN-L made a very nice and simple A frame tire holder for his boler American. Now that I have my own welder, I hope to copy it.

[Rusty99]

Originally Posted by GreenHorn

This is one we made for the back of a Casita. The first one did not have the allthread through the fiberglass when it was sold. The next Casita did, and you can see how they cut and capped off the allthread.

Excellent! This is exactly this kind of idea I had for my Boler