Have your cake and eat it lightweight stick and foamy build.

[printer]

Well that would be nice, I am not sure what will I end up with. The inspiration for the build is that I would like to travel around to visit different festivals. I have a car that has a 900lb tow limit so I will have to count my calories, I mean ounces as I build. Pretty sure it will not be a regular teardrop design, I want to have a seating area as well as minor indoor cooking space. AC is on my mind also, for health reasons I can not stand the heat. This will be partly a winter project, maybe more of a fall/spring one for thing I can't do in the house as winter is pretty cold in my neck of the woods.

I picked up a bolt together frame today that had 8" wheels on it. I went out and got some replacement 12" wheels and tires for it. I'll be looking at the frame and deciding what to do with it. It folds together for storage, that won't be an option after being built up so I'll be looking at welding it together and come up with any modifications to it that may make it more useful.

[RJ Howell]

See a proper tongue on it, yet concerned about the 8" wheels and what that means for axle capacity. You know it's rating?

Also curious about frame thickness. Bothers me to see that 2x4 (?) on edge..

[printer]

The outside rails are 2 1/4" by 2 1/4" and the rest is a box with the bottom side folded out on either side. Everything is 0.100" thick. I am thinking of using a couple of full length rails and using the pieces for cross members and the like. Haven't really worked out the detail, just first saw it this morning. These are used to haul a skidoo or ATV. I don't think the capacity should be a problem with the weigh being distributed, how much flex it has is a different story. I am sure the finished product will not look quite like what it started out like.

[RJ Howell]

Was hard to tell from the picture. Square stock at .10 steel. Ya, stay light.. Any idea what the axle rating is?

[printer]

I briefly tried looking up the trailer design, old add copy or something. No luck but I am going to try some more. I will take some measurements of it and see if it compatible to another design. A bit of searching for a needle in a haystack, or I might get lucky and some strange guy has it online. I do have an engineering book for steel structures, I could get an idea. But then what are the dynamic loads, how much do you factor in? I think the best way to go about it is figure out what the springs are rated for, the designer would have picked the spring rate for the intended load of the trailer. I will probably have to load one down and measure the deflection and then use a given live load to say what it could handle.

[printer]

I got pissed earlier. Before I went to buy the new wheels I took one off so that I had it with me to compare with the rims that were there. Didn't want to get the wrong rims. As luck had it the guy I snagged was pretty knowledgeable. On top of that he asked how I was going to use the trailer and then told me the tires that were with the rims on sale were bias ply and it would be best if I had radials. They were regular price but he looked up the history on them and they were on sale in July and he said he would give me for that price. Pretty happy about that.

What I was not happy about is trying to take the wheel bolts out of the hubs. With no weight on the trailer the wheel would just spin when I would turn the tire iron. In the end I managed to snug a pipe wrench on the inside of the hub and jam it into the ground. The pipe wrench was opened all the way and was only catching on the last thread of the wrench. But at least I got it off. No such luck with the other wheel. And I am persistent. I even had a bar propped against the hub inside, me on the trailer for weight and trying to twist the bolt loose. Well you can't say I didn't try. In the end I needed weight on the trailer if I was going to get the rim to stop slipping while on the tire. So my solution. Some plywood and blocks to get the up car on the trailer. Did three nuts, roll the car off, spin the tire, car back on, spin the last one loose.



I sure hope things go a little smoother as time goes on.

[pchast]

A few thoughts............
I wouldn't worry about that trailer frame if you did not bend things with that....
The axle could be a concern with your final weight.
Did you look at the load range on the tires you removed?
2 snowmobiles could weigh 800 lbs, I think. Someone else chime in here.

If you keep things to the lightest you can come in under 600 lbs. Adding cooking
and AC likely will add at least 100 lbs.

These structures are in a sense 'unibody'. Making a unitized structure resists
frame flex other than in the tongue.

[Pmullen503]

That is a harbor freight folding trailer. Probably the 1200 lb version. Lots of folks use that as their trailer. If you make your floor stiff, you really don't have to beef up the trailer. As mentioned above, you have a unibody situation.

I used 1/4" ply top and bottom, glued and screwed to 1x4 framework around the perimeter and across the width every 2' or so to line up with the trailer frame members. I filled the spaces in the floor frame with foam insulation which helps support the plywood floor between the 1x4 framing.

[printer]

The Harbor Freight Trailer seems to have C channel sections, could someone tell me what the width and height of them are?

[Pmullen503]

The main side channels are about 3" high and 1.5" wide.

[printer]

Thanks, it kind of looked that way but I was just guessing from pictures. I am going to have the leaf springs under the axle and might have the rails kick up by the wheels. I figure if I can get the floor to about the same height as my car I could do a solid trailer and not a popup. Won't be standing up but I do want some seating with enough headroom.

[printer]

After looking at many designs I think I will go with a sort of narrowed bobtail Campster12. I did want a standup height even if it is just scraping heads but in the end I think I can live with the Campster's height. It is a little higher than my car's outline but the drag should be livable. I am going to buy some 2 1/2" square tubing and add about 2' in between the folding trailer's middle. I plan on kicking it up where the leaf springs are positioned in order to drop the floor height elsewhere. Won't be an offroad camper but then again neither is my car.

[printer]

I managed to remove the back half and unbolt the axle. What a flimsy design, I guess good enough for some applications. I know the shell will give a lot of stiffness but I need to do a little modification more than just stretching the middle. There is going to be a few more hours sunk into this thing before I want to put a floor on it. And winter has already nipped at our heels here last week, good thing it warmed up and the snow melted, if it stuck around I might not have started till spring.

[printer]

It is 4 C (40 F) out and about 10 C (50 F) in the garage so I do not want to open my garage door in order to let out the welding smoke like I did a couple of days ago. So I found a little blower I had and jury rigged some ducting on it. Crack open the door and blew it out, Not perfect but manageable.



I welded up the edges where the bolted channel met each other. Today I cut some 1/8" plate and welded up the square cutouts in the frame. Well half of them, I need to do the second section. Not the prettiest of welds that I have done but I am sure it will improve the stiffness of the frame. I would feel better boxing in all the sections but that is a lot of work and I don't have too much of a building season left.

[printer]

Not a glamor shot, I used a section of the tongue that remained bolted (the tongue unbolted and pivoted to reduce the length for storage) and welded it in between the front and the second cross member. The tongue will be welded to it and since it is too short to reach the second cross member I am going to box in the remaining section. It should give a little stiffness to twisting. They had four bolt holes and the pivot hole in the same place, it will be outside of the frame members and since I was here I welded in plates inside the tongue to cover up the holes and get rid of a week point. The tongue will be on top of the cross members rather than underneath them as it was originally. This drops the trailer height four inches and has the tongue parallel to the road, hopefully. The tongue protruding above the deck is not a problem as the front section will be shelving and the back the sleeping area.