I pulled the trigger onan '02 Discovery this morning. Now I need to set it up to carry my KTM. The bike weighs about 295 lbs wet. The Discovery does not have SLS.

Any recommendations on motorcycle carriers and suspension mods would be appreciated.

 

your bike is not heavy, almost any carrier will work for you, just make sure your spare tire will not be in the way.

I used to have something similar hooked to my rodeo and it worked very well.

 

How heavy will those take? Would love to fit my 900RR on the back.

 

 

Your receiver will handle 550 pounds but you may want to consider changing out your suspension. Rovers have a tendency to droop with time, most of us have switched to Old Man Eme shocks and coils, giving a much better ride, more weight capacity and a little lift.

 

500lb is correct, and I would not recomend anything heavier, on bumpy road , the tongue may bend.
but for dirtbike they work great and are in the $250 / $350 range.

I have a ZZR 1200 with a wet weight of almost 600 lb, but for sport, sport touring bike, the carrier are heavier and way more expensive.

 

and don't forget to add the weight of the carrier to the weight of the bike.

 

I just purchased a Versa-hauler sport bike carrier and carried my YZF600R on the back of the Disco to the LR dealer this morning. It was kinda funny, as many people at the dealership were doing double-takes and making comments like; "Wow! Nice set-up!". Left the Disco for a recall repair and rode off to take care of my day. No need to waste time and money getting a rental, a bus or a cab.

I'll take a photo of it later and post it up,when I go to pick up the Disco and get the bike back on there again.

One thing is for sure, there's no question that you will need airbag inserts for your rear coil springs.The attitude of the truck was like a 747 on take-off rotation...and very twitchy handling at anything above 30mph although I was doing 50 in the slow laneon the freeway...and I wasn't liking it! Having worn out shocks didn't help the situation either...guess what I'll be installing this weekend? [&o]

I ordered a pair of Firestone 4121 airbags a week ago, but I'm still waiting on them. I have an AirLift kit with onboard compressoron my Jeep, so I'm gonna swap it over to the Disco with the new Firestone air bags. I Like the AirLift kit alot; the compressor, gauge and hardware is of better quality than the Firestone equivilentin my opinion. Butthere's no part# forLand Rovers inAirLift's catalog. When asked, they said I could give them the internalmeasurements of my Disco's coil springs and they most likely have an airbag that fits, but they wouldn't warranty them since they haven't done the R&D on Discos. So elected to go for the Firestone air bags with a warranty, and they will work with the AirLift compressor and fittings, no problem.

I can personally vouch for the effectiveness of the air bag inserts...totally transformed my Jeep when loaded up with a carrier and motorcycle.

Marc, you will need the airbags to carry your KTM safely. 295# plus the weight of the carrier is getting up there. My sport bike weighs 470# + 80# for the carrier = 550#, and that's the max tounge weight for the disco tow bar.

One other thing, as Loic pointed out, your spare might get in the way...all depends if the the carrier you get has enough clearance. The Vesa-Haul that I got has an adjustable ramp soyou can slide it closer to or further away from the back of your truck. I had to slide mine as far away as possible to clear the spare tire.

Also, make sure you have good tires with a decent load rating.

 

Thanks for the info. Fonzie, I'd love to see some pics of your rig.

I had to cancel a dual sport/single track trip to Colorado this fall. I'm kinda glad I did. If I can get a carrier set up right, it will be nice to be able to ride and do some easy dirt stuff in the Disco. But, I have until next spring to get ready.

 

Nice, my 900RR is about 435lbs. I was actually thinking I'd make a bolt-to-frame mount for the carrier vs using a hitch mount, just something with 4 cross pins. Probably need to design something that'll lift up as well since the bike is kinda wide and getting it up onto a lifted carrier would be tricky.