Golf Ball Trailer Hitch for Riding Lawnmowers/Lawn Tractors/ Garden Tractors

THE PROBLEM

Most riding lawnmowers/lawn tractor/garden tractors come equipped for a pin hitch. That's fine for trailers and implements with pin hitch tongues. BUT there are also things you want to haul around that have a ball hitch. So, you can buy a factory made trailer ball conversion kit for about $75 and then buy a really pretty chrome plated ball for about $15-20, spend an entire afternoon trying to put it all together, and for less than $100 you are in business.

OR follow this INSTRUCTABLE and MAKE YOU OWN FOR ABOUT $1

I flipped my trailer upside down and looky here, a golf ball fits PERFECTLY.

AND a regular old eye bolt is just the right size to fit in the hitch. So let's put the golf ball and the eye bolt together.

WHAT YOU WILL NEED

a golf ball

an eye bolt

some rubber tubing, garden hose whatever

a bolt and nut of your choice the same length as the diameter of the golf ball

band saw, jigsaw, hack saw, NOT a table saw and NOT a circular saw!!!

drill or drill press

We need to make the big hole in the eye bolt into a small hole. I found some old tubing in two different sizes but you could use that or a slice of garden hose OR wait for a slice of the golf ball to sand down and fill the hole. In the above I used a vice to push the the slices of hose into the eye bolt. You can do it with pliers, hammer or whatever.

The final assembly has to be the same size as the original golf ball. That means we will have to take a slice out of the golf ball. I got lucky here because the lines on this particular golf ball are the same width as the eye bolt and will serve as guides for sawing. You may have to draw lines on the golf ball with a sharpie if you don't have a pretty golf ball like the above.

I used a band saw to cut the slice out of the golf ball. BE CAREFUL, your fingers are really close to the saw blade. If you don't have a band saw or jig saw, use extreme caution. Do NOT attempt cutting the ball on a table saw or circular saw. Find a friend or neighbor with a band saw.

We need to recess the head of the bolt and the nut, or whatever you will use to hold the ball together. A carriage bolt would work well or flat head bolt or round head or whatever you have. We just need to get the head of the bolt below the outside curve of the golf ball. I used an end mill bit in this photo to create a recess.

So, I made a recess on ONE side of the ball and suggest that now you drill BOTH sections of the ball at one time so that you have a matching hole when you line up the two sections later.

NOTE: If you don't have pieces of hose or other things to make the big hole in the eye bolt into a small hole, sand down the slice of golf ball to make a big washer sort of thing to fill up the big hole in the eye bolt. Then drill a hole for the bolt to go through. It would be good to use one section of the golf ball as a guide to drill the hole.

Now that you know where the hole comes out on the other section of the ball, we need to make a recess for the nut. I happen to have a barrel nut so I'll use that but you can use whatever kind of nut you have...except a wing nut. A barrel nut doesn't need that much of a recess. I did this on a hand held belt sander clamped in a vice. There are lots of different ways to make the recess. Use your ingenuity. You have LOTS, that's why you read INSTRUCTABLES.

Do a trial fit to make sure the ball and eye bolt will fit into the trailer hitch. Make adjustments as necessary.

Screw the two sections of the ball to the eye bolt and do a final trial fit.

Attach the ball hitch to your riding lawnmower/lawn tractor/garden tractor. I used 2 nuts above and 2 nuts below the mounting plate because I really want the ball to stay exactly where I put it. Yea, it's overkill but it works.

Attach your trailer to you new golf ball trailer hitch.

CONGRATULATIONS You just saved yourself about $99 and a whole lot of trouble.