Spare Tire Tailgating: TireGate HitchGate Adventure

All HitchGate series spare tire (and more) carriers feature this anti-rattle mechanism. You simply insert the HitchGate into the hitch and tighten the bolt down.

All HitchGate series spare tire (and more) carriers feature this anti-rattle mechanism. Yo

Every 4WD vehicle made had a stock spare-tire mount somewhere on the vehicle, at some point. These are usually adequate until you start putting on larger tires, and the spare tire and wheel no longer fit securely where it did stock. If you’re a truck owner, it’s no big deal—you can strap it down in the bed or get a TireGate to secure the tire-and-wheel combo.

But for SUV owners, there really was no good place to mount a larger-than-stock spare. Putting a spare on the roof adds a lot of weight way up high, and putting it semi-leashed in the cabin gives it deadly potential in an accident or rollover. So what’s an SUV owner to do? And thus the HitchGate was created.

Since a picture is worth a thousand words, we’re guessing that we don’t need to explain what the new HitchGate Adventure model does. What you cannot see is that this swing-away tire carrier does not rattle, thanks to an anti-rattle mechanism in the hitch, and it’s light enough (without the spare and fuel can) to easily remove and place in your garage when not in use.

If you’re out for extended periods of time and need more than just a spare tire and extra fuel, there is also a Safari HitchGate model that holds everything the Adventure does, plus a rack and more cans for longer trips. But since we like traveling at high speeds we found it best for us to keep things light and just stick with the spare tire and jerry can mounted on an Adventure HitchGate.