Please excuse the long post.
I am not new to overland adventures nor am I new to building off-road trailers, but I am new to building an overland trailer and have a major questions about suspension design.
First let me start with describing my yearly overland trip. I drive from Texas to the Phoenix area where a bunch of us gather for a week of overland in AZ. We do trails that range from dirt roads to just about as hardcore as you want to get with a street driven rig (of course I usually bypass the super hard stuff as I have a 1200 mile drive home). The problem with designing an overland trailer to suit my needs is the great variance in weight. When traveling on road from TX to AZ and AZ to TX the trailer is at least 800lbs heavier than when in overland mode. This is because I carry a spare set of tires for the truck. I have already come up with a mounting design which will allow the trailer to handle the tires, but I am stuck on suspension. Trailer leaf springs are out as we have learned that the harshness is too much for items carried in the trailer and they can crack. I have a good set of truck leaf springs that are perfect with a set of shocks, but are too soft for the extra 800lbs weight carry ability I need when on road. I would really like to design an independent design with airbags like the AT trailers, but would rather leave a complicated design like that up to the experts. So, I am open to ideas? The only answer I have come up with to date is overload airbags for leaf springs, but I am not sure of the reliability of the overload airbags themselves.
Thank you for your help.
I am not new to overland adventures nor am I new to building off-road trailers, but I am new to building an overland trailer and have a major questions about suspension design.
First let me start with describing my yearly overland trip. I drive from Texas to the Phoenix area where a bunch of us gather for a week of overland in AZ. We do trails that range from dirt roads to just about as hardcore as you want to get with a street driven rig (of course I usually bypass the super hard stuff as I have a 1200 mile drive home). The problem with designing an overland trailer to suit my needs is the great variance in weight. When traveling on road from TX to AZ and AZ to TX the trailer is at least 800lbs heavier than when in overland mode. This is because I carry a spare set of tires for the truck. I have already come up with a mounting design which will allow the trailer to handle the tires, but I am stuck on suspension. Trailer leaf springs are out as we have learned that the harshness is too much for items carried in the trailer and they can crack. I have a good set of truck leaf springs that are perfect with a set of shocks, but are too soft for the extra 800lbs weight carry ability I need when on road. I would really like to design an independent design with airbags like the AT trailers, but would rather leave a complicated design like that up to the experts. So, I am open to ideas? The only answer I have come up with to date is overload airbags for leaf springs, but I am not sure of the reliability of the overload airbags themselves.
Thank you for your help.
