On Sat, 11 Sep 2010 14:43:08 -0500, Karl Townsend
wrote:

On Sat, 11 Sep 2010 00:12:36 -0500, wrote:


My 2500HD Chevy needs a gooseneck hitch. Unfortunately, there is a
heat shield that must be removed or a section cut out. Every shop I've
spoken with says the heat shield fasteners are installed with
something like Locktite and are almost impossible to remove.

When i did my gooseneck hitch, I removed the bed. There's only eight
bolts holding it on the frame.

Then I bolted in a serious plate between the frame rails and made the
ball hitch drop in a pocket. Then there was only a small hole in the
bed for the ball. made it real nice when using the pickup for
something else.

Karl

Thanks for everyone's replies.

Normally, I would do as you did, Karl. But I'm in a rush. I just
bought the truck and need it in a week. How did you handle the safety
chain issue? I've never seen a gooseneck ball/hitch fail; even a few
that should have with the truck and trailer turned over.

Here is the one I've chosen. http://turnoverball.com/ Everything is
below/between the ribs in the bed. There is one drawback, though. They
caution that the inverted ball may contact the differential on two
wheel drive trucks with heavy loads. Kind of negates the feature of
storing the ball in the hitch.