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Here are some pictures showing where I cut the side rails and located the new holes. Also the placement of the hockey pucks.
Very interesting!
So you basically just skipped the rear rectangle of the frame?
Does doing this put a lot of weight forward onto the tongue?
The tongue weight as it sits is 56#. By battery and spare will be mounted under the trailer, behind the axle slightly reducing the empty tongue weight.
in the 3rd and 5th picture you have the piece of the side rail that you cut off clamped to the remaining side rails. I assume that was in order to properly locate the new hole in the side rail for attaching the corner brace?
thanks
ken
You’re very close to CLC’s trailer at a third of the cost. Thanks. Since it also has 12″ wheels, I wonder if the CLC trailer also has a 45 mph speed limit, technically.
Will you leave the wheel fenders off? Do they interfere with the door? Can they be lowered compared with the height in Northern Tools’ illustration?
What’s a leaf of on a spring?
If 45 is the lawyer’s max, 55 still seems very safe. With this thing behind me, I’m on the road less traveled anyway.
The springs are leaf springs comprised of 3 leaves. These springs are rated for loads approaching 2000 lbs. Needless to say our tiny campers barely budge these so removing a leaf makes them a little more compliant.
Could I put 15″ wheels on this trailer? Larger wheels would increase the safe towing speed and also raise the camper three inches.
Here’s an article on “axle flipping”:
Flipping the axle raises the trailer bed a few inches. Can the axle on this trailer be flipped? A guy in the comments section at Amazon says that he flipped the axle on a 5×8 Harbor Freight trailer.
I’ll cut a hatch in the floor of the camper, so I can stand on the ground while inside. I’m 5’10”. If the roof is only a few inches higher than it appears in your pictures, I could stand straight up.
I just towed my camper mounted on a Trailex with 8″ wheels on it’s first trip. Highway speeds up to 75mph, no problems. Towed it on some fairly seriously rutted and washed out dirt roads — did not need 4WD though — but enough that it bounced the trailer around pretty good. No problems other than discovering that I need a better system of securing things in the galley. Tires threw an impressive amount of mud though, the fenders did their job well. Even for “normal” highway towing, you *will* want fenders.
I chose 8″ wheels specifically to *lower* the sitting height and the ergonomics of the door sill height as well as the functional galley flat height. On 12″ tires I think I would want a little step to comfortably use the galley , in fact CLC has just such a step they use with their demo TD. On 15″ tires the galley would be almost up to my chin!
Thanks, SOMDTD. I don’t worry much about the towing speed with 12″ tires, and I see your point about the galley height. Now that you mention it, getting the roof above my head would raise the galley flat nearly to my shoulders, so this myth is busted.
Regarding axle flipping (above), the video at Northern Tools’ website shows the axle clearly at 30 seconds. The axle is “flipped” in its normal orientation, so the trailer can’t be raised this way.
I have a couple trips and about 1000 miles on my camper. I would not change a thing about my trailer mods. I think the axle placement is about perfect.
someone asked about 15″ wheels. over the years I’ve seen so many small trailers at the side of the road with the hubs removed (burned out bearings) that I wanted to go with the larger wheels to reduce the rpm’s at 70 mph.
I knew that I would not be able to use the stock fenders, but I didn’t think about the wider tires rubbing the frame. so, I bought a pair of 1.25″ wheel spacers that move the tires out just enough to clear the frame and provide space for fenders. I purchased a set of fenders, with backs on them, from a local trailer supplier.
however, I didn’t think about the issue of extra height of the galley. we’ll see how big an issue that is.
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