I was just reading about the B II that Igobytwitch has in Project Logs. Near the end he says he now hates the spare tire carrier on the rear. For those of you who don't know about those carriers, THEY RATTLE REAL BAD!
When I bought my 86 B II the spare was inside, not the most ideal place either, took up a lot of room.
A couple months after getting it I just couldn't put up with the loss of space, so I started looking for a solution, the old way was to keep the spare under the back on pick-ups like they do now, but this has a 23 gallon fuel tank in the way. Then I remembered having a couple of old pick-ups with the spare mounted on the front.
After some figuring and measuring I came up with what is in the pictures.



It is almost all built out of 2" sq. tubing an weighs about 30#. Took about two hours to build and cost less than $10 then. The tabs that holdit to the frame go into stock frame holes with 1/2" bolts and nylocks.
If you have an older Ranger, this is a good way to go, I have built 7 of them for friends with Rangers. Those were mostly so a B II fuel tank could be added.
I will be taking it off when I do the engine swap, so will replace the above pictures with something more descriptive.

Ray

 

That's nice. I've seen some F-250's with spares on the front like that. Not a bad idea considering my spare tire carrier is completely gone from rust.