[CurlyDave]

Glad you commented on those tennis ball alignment item from HF. I saw them and wondered how they would be.

The tennis ball thingies work really well. The one that goes on the truck sits nicely on the flat spot on top of the ball. The one that goes on the trailer hitch is a little bit harder because there isn't a flat place to put it, but it is magnetic and I can almost always get it to stick more or less straight up with ~20 seconds of playing with it.

I will probably end up making a flat steel surface for the magnet to stick to on the trailer end. It may be as easy as a big flat washer and some epoxy to glue it on top of the trailer hitch.

Bob:

I got a chance to look at the hitch receiver and you are exactly right. My bucket is too thick for the part which goes under the bucket to make contact in the right spot. It looks like it will need about an inch of shim.

Now I know steel isn't free, but if I could make a suggestion, making the bearing surface under the bucket significantly thicker would allow the hitch receiver to be used on backhoes as well as CUTs. Maybe you could make a backhoe model and a regular one. I would gladly pay $10-15 more for a unit built to fit a backhoe.