OEM Hitch Snapped

You should be just fine to remove the busted hitch and buy a good quality hitch or factory with no other issues. The frame looks a little bent but because where it is it will not cause any problems.

 

Thanks, now I have that song stuck in my head.

 

Wow I can't believe I didn't have the factory hitch. I know there is a difference between the factory tow package and aftermarket but I was told that the tow package was factory installed and was consequently counting on the 6,5000 lbs of towing capacity. Does everyone else agree that my hitch receiver is some weak aftermarket junk? Is there anyone who disagrees and thinks that it is OEM?

 

Definitely an aftermarket piece

 

Agreed. I am still hung up on how sketchily attached it is.

 

Yeah, agreed, aftermarket. When I looked at your pictures I thought "there is no way that mine looks like that." That's when I went out to my truck and took the pictures of underneath and posted em' here.

 

Thank you all for your help. I ran the VIN # through the Toyota dealer (that they didn't charge me for) and it turns out my truck did not come with the factory tow package. Someone somewhere along the chain lied to somebody and now I have a truck that I bought for towing that I cannot tow with.

 

Since it did not come with the tow package you should also invest in a transmission cooler. Unless you have a manual transmission.
http://www.jegs.com/i/B-M/130/70264/10002/-1

 

How much are you planning on towing? I believe a non tow package truck has a tow rate of 3500lbs.

Check your sales paperwork on the truck, if it states OEM tow package, go back to them with the proof of not having it. Then have them install one at their cost.

Or you can upgrade it yourself.

 

Yeah, in shopping for my first Tacoma many years ago, I remember being told more than once that a certain truck had a factory installed towing package when if you crawled under the truck you could see it was obviously aftermarket. Buyer beware.

 

Just a little FYI: I've never seen even an aftermarket hitch look that sketchy.

This is what I have;
http://www.draw-tite.com/products/t...ame-receiver/WfzaCtfZMf0hoaEk3ihHPfg0TORDag1Q
**notice how it bolts onto two sides of both frame rails.
Or it might be branded "hidden hitch", can't really remember, both brand names are the same company and the same product.


Edit: My guess is that it is a KNOCKOFF of an aftermarket hitch.

 

Yay physics lesson! Surface mounting like the OP's hitch creates several weak points in the material. The frame itself unless it's boxed in is just c channel which is pretty easy to bend. The horizontal areas are the weak ones, the strength in the frame comes from the vertical. A good hitch will mount through the vertical so the stress from the trailer is being applied along the frames strongest direction. With just the 4 bolts being used in the weak area the frame will twist, as that happens more and more stress is put on the tabs of the hitch itself, which is (obviously) inadequate for the weight. Couple that with the movement allowed as the frame distorts and driving vibration, the tabs (again obviously) will eventually fail. If the hitch had wrapped so you had both the horizontal contacts and also mounted to the vertical, you would have had a strong mount that would likely not fail at all. The more directions to absorb the stress the stronger the attachment.

Even if it had been welded instead of bolted on only 1 plane, odds are you would have eventually had the hitch fail. The good news, with a little reinforcement and repair you can probably salvage the hitch and be fine (with a good welder). Or remove it and replace with a better brand which will likely make you sleep easier at night.

For most not new car dealers, a hitch is a 'towing package'. But really, as you've seen, a hitch is just a hitch. The OP's configuration, probably ok to about 2k pounds. After that...

 

Random question but why not with a manual?
Also anyone have any other good aftermarket hitches? I was thinking about getting a uhaul hitch setup

 

Auto's use fluid as a lubricant and also to cool the transmission. They pump fluid from the tranny through a cooler that usually part of the radiator. High heat with an auto means a failed auto and towing increases heat quite a bit. Manuals use gear lube, it's just a lube and the gears splash lubricate themselves. There's no pumping, pretty much no way (reasonably) to cool, and pretty much no need.

 

Interesting. Thank you for that bit of knowledge.

 

The distinction really isn't about the presence of a pump or the ability to cool. Some MT's do have pumps. I'm not certain if these ones do or not. The transfer case, I know, certainly does, and a transfer case isn't all that much different than a manual transmission. They even use the same lubricant.

Automatic transmissions have one component that is a real big "heat maker": the torque converter. In some ways, almost a separate part from the transmission itself, part of its purpose is much like a centrifugal clutch, in that the faster/harder the engine turns, the more force the fluid transfers to the driven side. So you have the engine working hard to move a lot of fluid in the torque converter, so much movement and so much pressure, that it heats up a lot. The majority of the heat produced in an automatic transmission is actually from the fluid itself.

Its really not quite right to consider the automatic transmission fluid as a coolant for the transmission, since the fluid is where the heat comes from. The transmission cooler is really a transmission *fluid* cooler. Think of it as being there to minimize the heating effect of the fluid.

When you are up at speed, the torque converter kind of shuts off. These units have lock-up torque converters. But if you are applying a high load (i.e. accelerating or climbing a hill), it will unlock the torque converter to allow the engine to spin up a bit without shifting. It also absorbs shock during the shift, which otherwise could increase wear on the shifting components inside the transmission. In other words, working the truck harder, will cause even more heat to be produced by the torque converter. All that extra heat has to be eliminated somehow, and that is the transmission cooler.

ALL Tacomas with AT have a transmission cooler, but a small one that is hidden inside the radiator. Its effect is limited for cooling, since it can't cool any further than the engine coolant temperature. It is also as much about warming the transmission fluid as it is about cooling, since cold fluid is too thick.

A manual transmission is something completely different. This is exclusively gear on gear. There is really no equivalent heat maker in a manual. You aren't applying huge pressures and pumping the fluid to transfer engine power. An *ideal* manual transmission is frictionless and produces no heat at all. Notice my use of the word "ideal". In practice, there is no ideal. But all of the heat sources in a manual transmission have an equivalent in an automatic. I.e., the Automatic has the same gear-on-gear friction as a manual has. Which means that you can imagine that the manual simply *lacks* the biggest source of heat that an automatic has. It has no torque converter. The clutch on a manual won't generate much heat, except while you are engaging it from a standstill, and even then, very little unless you are very bad at it.

Even with all this heat advantage, the manual transmission still does generate a good amount of heat. Just not enough to worry about.

 

Dang that is really in depth, but was worth the read. Thanks!

 

Never said the presence of a pump was the reason, just that it pumps through a cooler in the radiator. In an auto once the tc locks the main source of heat starts dying off. The radiator mounted cooler has been in pretty much every auto vehicle I've had, oldest was a 69.