Hauling the U25 in a dump bed trailer

[Natman]

Comments invited...., the dog hasn't made up his mind yet, I already had the trailer, within capacity, the bucket is secured down and sideways, and four tie downs on the lower. Hitting the road soon, 45 mph and 13 miles is all.

 

[Jonas302]

Did you need the bucket up there to get tongue weight? I would probably try to run it in backwards and keep the bucket in the trailer If thats going to be its every day ride and you absolutely need to have the bucket up there a little shelf welded on with chain tie downs sure would be a handy thing

 

[Natman]

When I first considered using this trailer, I thought I'd run it right up to the front, the blade right against the front sideboard, and set the bucket down behind me, like you said. But that made for a real heavy tongue weight, and the truck ( single wheel 1 ton HD no less) got the sags and also threw the trailer out of whack. So I backed it up to the position shown, and everything came into balance, with still enough tongue weight to tow correctly. But now no way to carry the boom to the rear. When I swung it around to the front, I was surprised to see it would position just perfect on the front sideboard, with the bucket fully curled. It tows great like this, couldn't have planned it out better! This configeration also leaves a big open space between the mini and the trailer rear, more room to carry more stuff if needed.

Unloading down the ramps, for only the second time, was a little uncomfortable, backing up, with boom forward. Later I realized I should have swung the house around and came down facing forward for better viz, and have the bucket near the ground as a safety back up. These machines have so many ways to do various tasks, like getting it off a trailer, and I'm still learning. Here's a pic of the way it was delivered when I bought it, not sure if I already posted it, just a 20' car hauler.

 

[hvy 1ton]

Is there enough room to swing the house one way and the boom the other to get it down inside the trailer? The way it is now is fine, i just get nervous about the top of the stick being the highest point.

 

[Natman]

Not enough trailer length for that, not even close, even with it skewed. But swung around to the front there is room left over, Total height is not too bad, about 10', but that's another good reason to build one exactly how I want it, a lower height on the road and a lower center of gravity.

 

[Tags]

The boom isn't any higher than the rops so I would think it's just fine. If you're going to use it to move the machine around just fabricate a "shelf" a little forward of where the bucket is sitting so it's not sitting on blocks and put some "d" rings on either side for tie down points.

 

[Ronsii]

On our dump trailer I just put the ramps in the back stacked then skew the machine and put the bucket 'flat bottomed on the ramps, but ours is a 36 mini so a bit bigger and in a 14' dump... how long is your trailer? doesn't look much shorter than the one I put the 36 in... also I have a foot of box blade on our blade so it sits back a foot from where it could with just the regular blade.

 

[oceanobob]

We see that setup all day long on the local roads and freeway. Typically diesel powered, occasionally a flat bed, mostly a pickup bed full of tools. DOT will likely "occasionally visit" w these folks but the contractors & trailer sales know to spec the version that is under 10k and keep it less than that.

 

[Graham1]

If you put a board on the tongue box to protect it you could then put the bucket down on that. I think it would look better resting on something. In reality probably no safer, but looks are important.
Graham

 

[Natman]

I decided to build a custom trailer for the mini, another day or so and I'll post some pictures. Here's the first day, hauling the bulk of the needed material home on my old trailer I built for my little Kubota tractor. The new one is similar but tandem axles, but also an open deck.

 

[Ronsii]

Open trailers are nice in some ways.... but.... it sure is nice with the dump trailer for smaller jobs to be able to move material around in the trailer and also to be able to throw whatever else you need for the job in the trailer with the mini... like pipe, fittings, jumping jack, buckets, etc.... and not worry about it bouncing off an open trailer

 

[ianjoub]

Chains and binders, not straps :cringe:

 

[Natman]

I had to custom fit 4 separate fenders, due to the oddball spacing since I am using torsion axles, the standard tandem fenders were much too long. I mounted the torsions as close together as I could, due to their load sharing characteristics. I did one side, and before doing the other it occured to me to load up the U 25 for the first time and see how much deflection I got, to make sure i had left adequate clearance. Good thing I did, one mount bracket had to be shaved down with a skinny wheel, and the second set was built with that mod standard.

As long as I had it on the trailer, I figured I might as well take it for a spin on the country gravel road I live on. No brake wiring yet, and not the binders I'll be using but it towed fine and handled great. Back in the shop, I figured up my empty unsprung weight, using standard steel weight tables plus adding the misc. things like the hitch, jack, and fenders. 989 lbs., with an all up weight of 1309. More then a ton less then my dump bed trailer, living on a mountain side 1200' above the valley floor, I'm a weight weenie and have been for decades. No way do I want to pull (and descend with) more then a ton extra everytime I haul the mini. the intent of this trailer was to be a bare bones U25 mover, the dump bed will be my gravel hauler, trash hauler, and the trailer I'll lend out to friends for moving or whatever. Out of pocket expense was $2200.00, less by a fair amount then I could have store bought something that wasn't what I wanted. I will keep this inside, so wanted it just long enough and no more, but rather then waste material (main frame is 5" channel, with 3' channel and 2' angle iron for the walkway) I used up the 20' lengths and made it 13'. I had planned on 12' at first.

I drive up it blade first, facing forward, and use the blade to control the tip over from the ramp angle to the bed's angle, nice and smooth. Coming down, I spin the house around and use the boom to make the opposite transition smooth an unexciting as possible. Next will be wiring the lights, brakes, and breakaway system, safety chains, and I'm done. One unexpected feature of using the torsion axles, is when I jack it up to clear the ball, the forward axles clear the ground, so with a wheel on the jack end I can easily roll and position, as long as I'm on a concrete floor that is, a huge advantage over a trailer with all 4 wheels on the ground. I think I nailed my CG pretty good, I'll make a trip over some scales once in town and get an idea but it feels and looks about right.

 

[Ronsii]

Not a bad lookin mini hauler

I hear ya' on the weight thing, I just like being able to roll onto a small complex job with one rig when we're busy otherwise someone else has to bring another truck/trailer/dumptruck/etc...

I also have a small 16 foot two axle 14k car trailer have used for the 36 mini we have and it is at least a ton less than the dump trailer probably more... have never tried using the blade to 'round' the tipover, always just put the bucket on the floor of the trailer when loading and crowd as I go forward the pull the boom up easy... and reverse it for unloading like yourself

One neat thing about my car hauler trailer is for the mini I don't even really need ramps cause it's only 8-10 inches off the ground in the rear so I just put the bucket on the floor to lift it up and over and voila!!! loaded