Lightweight Trailer Build

[onething]

Tahnks for sharing. I doubt I'll ever need a car trailer, but I learned a lot.

[Davidss]

Ok so I took the car off the lift and rolled it back to prep it for paint.



The prep is the most important step of any paint work. Here is after wire brushing, some grinding, and a hand wash with wax and grease remover. On a job like this if you aren't spending hours on prep then you won't have good results.



Even though the rustoleum bedliner will stick to bare metal I decided to spray primer anyway. This turned out to be pretty crucial as the spray primer will get into all the cracks the bedliner won't. In addition it makes it really easy to spot places you missed with the bedliner.



And 2 coats of bedliner 2 hours apart. It looks awesome in person. I am very impressed with the rustoleum bedliner for $40.

[OZMDD]

Agreed. You should've built two of those at the same time, I have no doubt you'd be able to sell it. Great job.

[Rogue]

Drool!

[Sharpie]

2 computers, red X each time.

[Rogue]

OK, hows that. :8

[Davidss]

Got the licence plate today. In Texas if the trailer is 4000lbs or less gross there is no title or vin. So all I had to do was sign my name, pay $50, and walk away with a plate. So as of now the trailer is basically finished. I'll post some final pics later this week.

Cost: A few people have asked to post up the total cost. I have kept track of everything so that is no problem. I would like to stress that this was not a super budget build. I set out to build a really awesome trailer that was far lighter and a better fit for a small car. I will always get better gas mileage with this trailer and if I want I could tow with a minivan or SUV. Not to mention the lower CG height, better ride/handling, shorter ramps, and the ability to open the door over the fenders. There are very few lightweight commercial trailers out there (trailex, featherlite, ???) and they all cost around three times what I spent or more.

Labor: I started work on February 1st so it took me around a week and a half. That was some days working a few hours, some full days, and a few days not working at all. I really took my time on this build so it went a lot slower than it needed to. In addition I started the build without all of the parts. If I was to do it over again I could do it all in 2-4 full days (not counting picking up parts beforehand).

Tools: Not counting basic hand tools I used both mig and tig welders, a metal chopsaw, plasma cutter, and three angle grinders. But you could get by with either a mig or stick welder, and a single angle grinder (just tip the guy at the metal yard to cut the metal accurately).

On the left is my actual trailer build. On the right is what I would have ended up spending on a single axle budget build.

[Webspoke]

Great job there, especially for your first! You should get many years of good service out of it.

[Davidss]

Time to post some final pictures and conclusion. I hit the 1000 mile mark on the trailer today and all has been perfect so far. Having a car/trailer this light has made a big difference in towing mpg. A month ago I towed a 5000lb car/trailer/stuff on a 6 trip and got 13.5mpg. This weekend I made the same exact journey 2500lbs lighter with the cruise control set to the same speed and got 15.6mpg. Over the total 1000 miles I have averaged right at 16 mpg using regular unleaded!






I need to find some shorter straps.



Being able to open the doors over the fenders rules!



Here is a closeup of the rustoleum bed coating. It turned out great!



These are ATV ramps rated at 2000lbs. I called the company that sells them and they did not seem to think that putting a car on ATV ramps would be a problem. And since the car can't put all 4 wheels on them at once I have a pretty good bit of safety margin.

[Keifersmith]

Great job David! That really turned out to be one sweet trailer. Enjoyed following your thread.

[jrj512]

Great job David! That really turned out to be one sweet trailer. Enjoyed following your thread.

Indeed.

[jbh]

I saw this trailer on Monday in person. Its very cool! Great job David!

[ken o]

Looks good. Cover your plate when towing on toll roads so they don't ding you with a toll.

[miataspeedracer]

Very nice build!

Is that single chain on the front the only means of securing the front of the vehicle? Seems like you are single fail point away from potential trouble...

[Nails]

+1 on what Speed said. Also is that Enkei on the front and 6UL on the back?

[Sharpie]

That is one nice CRX. Great job on the trailer.

And Rogue, that picture is jealousy at it's finest.

[OZMDD]

different width wheels, 7 and 7.5.

I helped him load it up, I think the chain mount is pretty overbuilt. Everything is rated many times higher than the weight of the CRX. Also stabilized by rear straps. I think that if the car moves enough to cause the chain to fail, the car will be off the trailer anyway, or at least trying to be. At that point, its better to just keep on driving.

[Keifersmith]

Well David, guess you could have saved some work and just rigged up something like this.

Miata_on_roof.jpg

[Rebel]

Well David, guess you could have saved some work and just rigged up something like this.

Miata_on_roof.jpg

I'd like to see how that setup works.

[OZMDD]

I'd like to see how that setup works.

Gives new meaning to "this is how I roll"