buying a surplus trailer, step by step

[jcbrandon]

Home safe; no drama

Got the surplus trailer home today. No muss, no fuss, no drama.

I had planned to use the winch on the front of my truck to pull the surplus trailer onto the rented U-Haul car trailer. Figured I would pull the winch cable under the truck and out the back to grab the trailer. With a bit of luck, thought there might be a big anchor, say a surplus deuce-and-a-half, conveniently located that I could hook a snatch block onto to reverse the pull. Didn't happen.

Instead, the fellow who processed my paperwork and directed me into the storage yard pulled up in a giant front-end loader with a forklift attachment and loaded the trailer for me. Just picked it up and placed it gently onto the hauler. Easy-peezy, lemon-squeezy. Took way longer to tie it down than to load it.

And jagular7, thanks much for the offer. Much appreciated.

 

[Maximus Ram]

What...no pics....:elkgrin:

 

[jcbrandon]

flying trailer

 

[jagular7]

Well, it looks like you got the rear stand with it but no front stand or was it folded?

Would you do it again?

 

[jcbrandon]

all there

Rear stand, front landing gear, lights, electrical connector, both parking brakes work, wheels turn, tires hold air. Couple small holes in the bed where something was welded in then removed. Pretty fair shape, actually.

I'd do it again. Second time would be much easier now that I know what to expect. And having gone through the EUC application process once, the second time should go much quicker.

But really, buying the trailer and getting it home are the easy parts. All I've really done so far is poke around on the Internet, spend money, wrangle some equipment, and go for a nice drive. I was already pretty good at most of those things.

Now I need to start the real work: Swap the axle, buy wheels and tires, pound dents, convert the coupler, convert the lights, get it Line-xed, get it registered... and lots more unknown stuff.

If you missed it earlier, I'm planning to use this as a utility trailer. If anyone can point me toward information on converting it to a tilt trailer, or installing a dump mechanism, I would be most appreciative.

cheers,

 

[jagular7]

Cool. Got some helpful info for you.

Axle swap - do you plan to have parking brakes? Electrical brakes? Choosing an axle is quite easy when you go through the mfr website. They will actually place the leaf mounts exactly where you want them to match the trailer's location. Simple and easy.
Overall width will be determined after wheels and tires are chosen. There are some conditions to be concerned with but they may not be so critical as you may think. They are outlined on mfr website. I went with a leaf under Dexter 5on4.5 3500# axle for my M101 trailer frame with parking and electrical brakes.
If you plan to remove the military wheels from their axle, you'll need IIRC 1.5" socket. Once side will be left hand rotation, other right hand rotation so make note on the nomenclature of the nut. It will tell you.
The drum will be huge and weigh quite a bit. You can remove that and go for disconnecting the parking brake cable, but its a lot easier just to cut it outside the backing plate and roll the axle out from underneath. The axle tube will be huge again IIRC 3.5" diameter.

Sheetmetal work is fun and this sheetmetal is a little thicker than what you have probably experienced in cars over the year. The trailer should be old school. Be careful not to breathe the dust that may come off from the paint. The paint is special application to the military and can be harmful to the human body.

If you plan to convert the front coupler, might as well remove the heavy triangulation and front all together and replace with lighter material as that design was for upwards of 5000#s offroad. Doubt you go that high. I've sold off the lunette tongue, coupler, base, and chains for a handsome $130 amount. You can actually design into the new triangulation the capability to have it tilt. Add bushings at the spring mounts where the A-frame ties into, have the holes at the front of the frame larger for pins to pull for tilting, and use the parking brake as a way of making the trailer tilt with weight. Once the weight emptys, it will come back down. Only thing you will need to be concerned with is the overall ride height. That will determine how high the trailer will tilt. Don't forget to add a front swing stabilizer since the stock one is non-adjustable. The stock rear stabilizer is adjustable, but I don't recall the distances. It will probably be too tall for lower tires. But it should be easy to 'shorten' it.

Lights - you can find 12v lamps that will fit the light housing terminals. Make note of the terminals lamp locking points on the side. You will have to note which is which in the wiring so when you change the trailer end it will work correctly with the pull vehicle wiring.

 

[ntsqd]

I possible option on the tilt that occured to me while reading jagular7's post would be to use one of the engine hoise type hyd rams, centered at the front of the bed section.

 

[jcbrandon]

Thanks

Thanks for the tips.

I'm starting to think these things are worth more as parts than as a whole trailer. When I picked mine up I talked with another buyer who has a lot of experience in buying and selling them. He said the going price for an axle-wheel-tire assembly is about $200. And figure $30 each for the lights. Sounds like selling off the bits I don't want might go a long way toward funding the bits I need to buy.

I've poked around on the Dexter axle site. Lots of great information there. I plan to duplicate the wheels and tires on my tow vehicle: Eight-lug on 6.5" (I think), 17" wheel, 33" tires. Since upgrades on the truck (2007 Dodge Power Wagon) are popular, take-offs are available and affordable. I can get four lightly used tires and wheels for less money than four new tires. So I'll have eight identical wheels and tires for the truck and trailer. Two interchangeable spares; excellent.

Dexter shows eight on 6.5 hubs on a 6500-pound axle. I'll get big electric brakes and parking brakes. I hope to be able to haul about 5,000 pounds (1.5 yards) of gravel in this thing. I'll try to keep the M101 leaf springs. If they're not up to the job it should be simple to find some that are.

Existing ride hide has the bed at about 36 inches off the ground. Sounds high until I measured my pickup which is 42 inches. Existing trailer tires are 35" diameter. So my planned tire swap will lower the trailer by an inch. Going to a spring under might be right. I do want to keep the trailer high enough to pull it on desert trails. Will have to make that decision based on how much I want that compared to the much better tow characteristics on pavement from a lower center of gravity.

Wouldn't have any pictures of your tilt set-up, would you?