Thread: Calculating trailer floor height

I don't think I've explained what I'm building very well. It's going to be essentially a camper trailer front with an enclosed rear.

I'm looking at doing it this way as the cost of a camping trailer tent to go on top of a bike trailer is horrendous (I'm trying to do it as cheap as possible), but I am still looking into getting a standard camping trailer tent modified to go on top of a bike trailer, but it might also be too expensive/difficult.

As I don't want 2 trailers, I'm playing with the 2 in 1 option and I've attached a rough plan of what it will look like below.

Thoughts/ideas would be appreciated.


rough trailer plan.jpg

Reminds me of the 2.5t trailer I was thinking about at one stage to carry my slide on camper, plus lathe on trolley and milling gear in boxs at front, one open with ramped doors and the other shelved and std doors. I was then going to carry timber plus anything else I needed in the ute.

trailer design 2.jpg

Ended up going with the lazy axle on the ute and kept my old 1.5t trailer. Mainly because I had already laid down money for the ute upgrade, but in hindsight I seriously regret not going for the new trailer idea.

Originally Posted by bishboy

It's going to be essentially a camper trailer front with an enclosed rear.

Thoughts/ideas would be appreciated.


rough trailer plan.jpg

Just passing through...
First impression when seeing your sketch was ouch!
You are a similar size to a car trailer, so it may be instructive to have a look at a few of those and see how they are made, especially those with truss sides.

However, the ouch was more about weight distribution. If you think about having 2 motor bikes in the back, the centre of gravity for them is likely to be behind the back tyre somewhere. If you assume the the trailer is going to be as light as possible with uniform weight distribution so its C of G sits above the wheels, you will need an equally heavy tent to counter-balance the back end. Without the bikes in the back, the C of G for the heavy tent will be between the drawbar and the wheels, so you will have the opposite problem with drawbar force. (I was once told for the average car/trailer combo the vertical drawbar force should not be more than around 50kg or you risk damage to the towbar when going over bumps/ potholes etc - sounds reasonable) - That is, with bikes but no tent the trailer will want to pull up off the hitch; with tent but no bikes it will be heavily pushing down.
However, tents are (relatively) light, so I would suggest that your design needs to be arranged so that the centre of gravity for the motorbikes is between the axles and then see how you can arrange a tent - on top of the box section? A separate unit? Slide out section between the bikes? Can you load the bikes sideways fore and aft with a box section in the middle (or the other way around).
Just some thoughts
Michael

Yeh I;d be thinking of a shorter trailer with a rooftop tent..... maybe a hard platform folding down onto the drawbar ...... roll out awning out the side with kitchen under.

Y got be able to get this all in under the 1200Kg.

Remember all that extra weight costs you 3 times ...... once when you pay for the steel, once when you pay for the towing capacity and again when you pay for the fuel.

cheers

Perhaps stand your tent trailer on its side and fold down over the guard? At least one bike can go beside it. Would help with weight distribution.

Get the odd cust inquiry with a similar dilemma ie motorbikes/go carts and tent trailer together on one trailer. Go carts of course are lower, so fully enclosed trailer and tent with cover on top, isnt a bad option.

Bikes on the other hand much higher, so if bikes are parked under then your tent has to be a quite high off the ground.

Weight distribution with your design has already been discussed, so wont flog that any further.

Tent trailers we have built here in the past come in at about 100 Kg. Thats your tent work, bars and bed base.

Gday Bishboy. Been reading this with interest & also other trailer builds within this section & about eight headers down - Track bike trailer build - comes up as a very interesting & detailed build complete with costings. Every conceivable issue seems to be addressed in this particular build.Taking on board what Soundman says about fitting a hard floor/tent on top could easily be adapted for your use looking at that trailer.

Thanks for the input. I was concerned by the length of the trailer and I was going to use water tanks etc to even out the weight distribution.

But I might go for something similar to my original enclosed bike trailer design and get a camper trailer tent modified to fit.

Something similar to this, trailer wise. The tent manufacturer wants $5000 for the tent as pictured











With a tent arrangement along these lines, can use as many or few of the sections as you like, even mix and match. Will ask some upholstery places about the cost and effort of adding 75cm arond the top, between the roof and side panels. The poles will be easy enough to sleeve and make longer. The full tent is about $2000 before alterations.




Back to the drawing board I suppose. There is a camping expo up here at the end of June, I'll go to that and have a good look and ask plenty of question.

The tent manufacturer wants $5000 for the tent as pictured

So we are just talking the canvas work, canvas support bows, and bed base as pictured? If so that would'nt be too hard to beat. And yes I do know something about the subject matter.

Will ask some upholstery places about the cost and effort of adding 75cm around the top, between the roof and side panels.

When it comes to alterations, extending zip on annex walls can usually be done without too much bother. Other parts are somewhat trickier. It goes without saying time = $