Tow bars on as 2013 Cherokee?

The friendliest place on the web for anyone with an RV or an interest in RVing!
If you have answers, please help by responding to the unanswered posts.

caltex

Well-known member
Joined
Feb 14, 2005
Posts
731
Location
North Texas/Northern California
I purchased a 2013 Grand Cherokee to tow behind the motor home, replacing the Tahoe. Installed Roadmaster tow brackets and an Air Force brake system. (I really wanted the M&G brake, but there was no room at the master cylinder for the M&G unit) Now the forward looking radar won't work properly. The Jeep dealer says there is a factory bulletin saying that installation of tow bars will cause misalignment of the radar and it can't be properly aligned with the bracket installed.  It's obvious that the radar won't work with the cross bar attached but with it removed, I see no reason for the frame brackets to interfere withe the radar system. Anyone else have this problem?

 
Robert,

We are about to purchase a 2014 Grand Cherokee Diesel, and currently use a Roadmaster All-Terrain bar and the AF1 braking system.

My question is about how much trouble the Roadmaster mounting brackets were to install.

Any feedback on your experience will be appreciated.

Kim
 
Cal Russ Mahoney has been having some sort of trouble with his GC, front park assist doesn't work and annunciator says sensor needs cleaning. He says the front collision avoidance seems to work when the cruise is on.


I know it went back to the dealer a bunch if times and his BIL was the service manager. ::)
 
I have the 2013 Grand Cherokee with the Roadmaster tow bar. Installation was easy, I took it to the M&G aux brake factory (a short drive away) and let them install it.  You do need to take off the plastic under the bumper and shave a little off to allow for the bracket. Unfortunately they couldn't install the M&G brake because of the clearances in front  of the master cylinder (maybe by now they have a solution).

My problem started when I had the Air Force brake installed by a local RV dealer.  He left a wire dangling in front of the "eyeball" of the radar. It must have been wind related since when parked, I could see nothing blocking the sensor.

I concluded that the Jeep dealer who told me you couldn't use a towbar with the sensor had to be talking about leaving the bar across the two brackets which obscured the sensor. Absolutely, It won't work if you install something that covers the sensor line of sight.

But that wasn't my problem, since I always take the bar off when I am using the car on the highway (parking when you unhook to go to dinner and don't want to remove the bar would not work of course).

I traded in a Tahoe dingy for the Jeep.  I liked both and have had good luck with both.  The Cherokee diesel sounds like a  great toad to me. Note: I believe that the running gear (not the engine and transmission) is the same as the smaller Mercedes SUV.
 
So the issue was the way the Air Force One pieces were installed, not the actual tow bar mounts?

We went through a little of that when my AF1 was installed on the Honda, because the space at the opening was so limited. But I did not have stealth radar, either.  8)

The main thing for me is that the tow bar part of the installation is not prohibitive.
 
From my experience, the tow bar brackets present no problem ... but when you put the cross bar on it sets in front of the sensor and the radar won't see through it. So usually when you have the cross bar on, you are towing the Jeep, and it isn't a factor. However ... it's possible that the bracket installer could do something goofy and screw up the alignment of the sensor.
 

Latest posts

Forum statistics

Threads
134,552
Posts
1,431,370
Members
140,125
Latest member
Schwabelectric
Back
Top Bottom