Hi, new to the forum. I bought a 91 B250 extended XPLORER camper this spring and am loving it. I have been making small updates to it and have hit something I could use some help on.

The full size spare tire is mounted to the back door and I am thinking about moving it (it really weighs on the door and gets in the way of my bike rack).

On the stock vans were the spares mounted underneath in the back of the van? It looks like there is room, but I don't see any evidence of it having been there before on mine. If they did mount them there, how is it mounted?

Thanks!

 

There was a manual crank cable lift mechanism there. It must've been removed for the van conversion process. Watch this video starting about 30 seconds in to see just how it was supposed to work from the factory.

 

Thanks for the reply! I'll take a look. I assume they put it on the back for a reason, either the camper conversion or the hitch installation, but now I know where and what to look for. I'll look for signs of the crank set up and do some measurements to see if I can get it back in there.

 

some build a mount for the front bumper I have seen on the road especially on campers

 

Either to make room for a trailer hitch, or just for some extra ground clearance.

 

All years up 1997 the gas tanks are mounted underneath where the 1998 to 2003 vans the spare tire is mounted

 

Pretty sure what he meant to say was:

Up to 97 (98 actually) the gas tank is mounted in the rear. On 1999 and up, the plastic fuel tank is mounted under the center of the van on the left side. Exhaust pipes are run under the right side. 1999 - 2003 have the spare mounted under the rear floor suspended by a pulley/cable that is raised/lowered by the jack handle. It tends to work its way loose over time resulting in annoying bumping/sliding but it is functional, out of the way, and it does work.

No problem with mounting a class III/IV hitch on a '99 -03: it will fit with the spare tire in place. I don't know if you can adapt a '91 to this but if your fuel tank is not located in the rear it sounds possible.

 

My van has a trunk installed across the bottom rear of the van but it came with 2 other locations to install the spare. The first location was on the back door...my dad liked that idea so much he took the mount off the van and threw it away. The second location is inside the coach on the passenger side right at the back. Roadtrek made the bench seat on that side just big enough to accept a full sized spare laying flat so that is where the tire lives now. If your seat isn't big enough you could probably do some woodwork to make it fit.
The newer Roadtreks have double rear doors and a special trailer setup with two 2" receivers. One is off to the left and tilts so you can mount the tire onto the frame with it laying flat on the ground and then you tilt up the whole thing for travelling. That it better than trying to lift an LT tire 4 feet off the ground onto a couple studs but it is still pretty heavy.
Regards, Steve