I wanted to buy rear mounted forks to move things around the property on a pallet. My first need was to move a refrigerator to the rear of the house into the basement. I searched the net and couldn’t find any. Surely Titan made them, but no.
I already had a Titan 2” Receiver Hitch mounted to my Quick Attach, so I started from there to make my own. My first idea of the prototype was to keep the ball hitch installed and insert the forklift tongue through the ball hitch, so the first attempt used a 1.5 x 1.5 square tube through the ball hitch, but it placed the weight of the heavy old refrigerator a little too far back, making the front end of the tractor a little light. I was able to move the refrigerator around to the back of the house, but I knew a redesign was needed to get the forks about 7” closer to the tractor.
I removed the trailer hitch ball and found a piece of 2 x 2 square tube that fit over the original 1.5 x 1.5 tube and this fit nicely into the Titan receiver. I drilled a small hole in the rear of the tongue to insert a bolt. The refined assembly looked like this.
I needed to change the angle of the tongue so that when fully down, the forks would be level with the ground and when fully up, the angle wouldn’t be too harsh. The first tongue was at a 90 degree angle with the frame, but this resulted in the forks being sloped down when lowered. An 8 degree angle did the trick.
This is the final finished product after a few alterations and will fit perfectly into the Titan hitch.
Here is some more detail for anybody who would like to build one of these. By the way, I stood on the very end of the forks and jumped up and down and they proved to be very strong. There was no bending of the steel and the rear tires moved up and down accordingly.
The square tube is not thin wall; I would guess it’s about 14 gauge.
The measurements shown allow the forks to fit near the outside edges of a standard 40 x 48 pallet. The risers on the left and right fit nicely under the Titan receiver so that the pallet doesn’t doesn’t sway and adds some support so that the tongue isn’t bearing all the weight. The pads above the risers spread the weight, but I had to add them when I changed the angle of the tongue to take up the space created by the design change. As long as the total height is correct, the risers can be made any way you like.
Note how the forks attach to the frame. One surface of the square tube overlaps the frame on the top and one on the bottom. This adds strength rather than having a butt joint on all four sides of the tube. The total fork length from the weld is 47.5”
I already had a Titan 2” Receiver Hitch mounted to my Quick Attach, so I started from there to make my own. My first idea of the prototype was to keep the ball hitch installed and insert the forklift tongue through the ball hitch, so the first attempt used a 1.5 x 1.5 square tube through the ball hitch, but it placed the weight of the heavy old refrigerator a little too far back, making the front end of the tractor a little light. I was able to move the refrigerator around to the back of the house, but I knew a redesign was needed to get the forks about 7” closer to the tractor.
I removed the trailer hitch ball and found a piece of 2 x 2 square tube that fit over the original 1.5 x 1.5 tube and this fit nicely into the Titan receiver. I drilled a small hole in the rear of the tongue to insert a bolt. The refined assembly looked like this.
I needed to change the angle of the tongue so that when fully down, the forks would be level with the ground and when fully up, the angle wouldn’t be too harsh. The first tongue was at a 90 degree angle with the frame, but this resulted in the forks being sloped down when lowered. An 8 degree angle did the trick.
This is the final finished product after a few alterations and will fit perfectly into the Titan hitch.
Here is some more detail for anybody who would like to build one of these. By the way, I stood on the very end of the forks and jumped up and down and they proved to be very strong. There was no bending of the steel and the rear tires moved up and down accordingly.
The square tube is not thin wall; I would guess it’s about 14 gauge.
The measurements shown allow the forks to fit near the outside edges of a standard 40 x 48 pallet. The risers on the left and right fit nicely under the Titan receiver so that the pallet doesn’t doesn’t sway and adds some support so that the tongue isn’t bearing all the weight. The pads above the risers spread the weight, but I had to add them when I changed the angle of the tongue to take up the space created by the design change. As long as the total height is correct, the risers can be made any way you like.
Note how the forks attach to the frame. One surface of the square tube overlaps the frame on the top and one on the bottom. This adds strength rather than having a butt joint on all four sides of the tube. The total fork length from the weld is 47.5”
