boat trailers made from wood/ no weld metal trailers

I've heard metal loses its strength when it's been heated. What about using recycled metals of all types? Even household metals like cans? I've read up on blacksmithing and seen how to forge using hay or saw dust as an emulsifier, but I think it would be easier done by torch and most hardware stores are geared up for that.

I'll look into it and there are tons of used tools like that for sale. This area is big on home welding. I don't see how having a wooden boat trailer would hurt and might be cheaper for now. I'll be on the look out for some nice equipment though.

 

Blackdaisies,

I've been looking for free wooden flat bed camping trailer plans on the web, but haven't been too successful. Do you have a link for one?

Thanks.

 

Try sorting through the trailers on this site. None of the ones I looked at were designed as flat-bed open trailers, but I imagine you could just stop before adding the sides and top...

http://www.tinytears.cc/scans.html

add: the "honeymoon house trailer" has a pretty simple box frame for the floor. It uses metal brackets at the corners, metal tie rods to stablilize the axle, and metal cross bracing, and shouldn't be hard to convert to a boat trailer of the desired size and shape.

 

If you can't find the trailer parts locally marine hardware outfits such as T. A. Mahoney carry a wide range of parts.

http://tamahoney.com/

 

i think a wood trailer made from laminated beams and epoxy would be very strong and corrosion resistant. a friend of mine made one out of jarrah and it passed inspection and was registered without a problem.

 

http://www.woodworkersworkshop.com/camper_trailers.php

Here's all kinds of plans for trailers. Hope that helps! I bought a small trailer for parts for the inside of a boat I had intended to try to build, but I moved and didn't have room at my last place to start the project. This year could be a nice year for it, but at least I have all the goodies to put into it like a gaas stove, camping toilet, and a sink, plus the kitchen table and seating can be transferred directly when it comes time. I can then use what's left of the frame for a trailer to haul it. Works for me, but I haven't started any of it yet, regretebly so. I'm hoping I'm in a place where it will be easy to pull it in and out now. The boat is only a 16 footer.

Good luck on your wood trailer project.

 

I read in an article that one problem with wood trailers is that they may float when backed in to pick up the boat - not sure if this is true or not.

 

I think you are supposed to put slats in every other board, so they will sink, but not sure, you want the frame and the rollers to roll the boat safely on the trailer without knocking out any of the keel or other pieces, I don't think they are intended to be made with a fully finished floor that you can walk on. Just thinking, I thought someone mentioned it before, it's been a while.

 

I'm looking at the 'Honeymoon House Trailer' myself, as a starting point for building a trailer for Blue Rose, our 15 1/2' flat bottom canoe. The HHT is built on a flat bed that's basically a 4'x8' platform. So if I let the Rose ride up over the tongue, she'll hang out the back three or four feet. No problem; I can clamp towing lights and a license plate to the transom.

Since the trailer has metal cross bracing fore and aft, I wouldn't really need a solid deck on it; I could just plunk two or three removable cradles into pockets. To use it as a utility trailer, I could just remove the cradles and plop a 4x8 piece of plywood on it. Front, side and rear gates could go into pockets, like on a stake bed truck (the same side pockets the cradles would fit into, as a matter of fact).

Damn. I think I just talked myself into another project... I actually have an old wood-framed trailer sitting in a back corner of my place, that I've been considering converting into a Jeep trailer for camping. Better to just chuck the existing frame altogether I think, and use the axle and hardware for a boat trailer.

I've been carrying Blue Rose on top of my pickup., and that does work. I'm good with trucker hitches, and I have it down to a science now. By the time I get done sucking down on five ropes, she's welded to the cab and rack; nothing moves her. Not even the desert winds, or the infamous Santa Ana winds closer to the coast.

But when I'm alone, it's a royal pain to spend the time dragging her out of the water, turning her over and stuffing her up onto the pickup, then burn another twenty minutes tying her down.

Life would be so much easier if I could just pull her onto a trailer, tie her down, and start chunking my ice chest, fishing gear, cooking gear, camping gear, and whatever other gear into her, to hold the trailer down on the highway....

 

Pictures ? please

The only issues I see with building a wooden trailer from a functional point of view is that its bound to be heavier than a steel or aluminum one, might not make much of a difference on a small boat but anything over x feet and it just wouldn't be practical. I think I'll stick with my plans for a custom steel trailer.

 

Yeah... there's no doubt in my mind that for 'serious' trailers, welded metal is the only practical way to go. But for fairly casual, lightweight applications like mine, I think wood can work just fine.

Or I could get lazy, and just buy a small boat trailer in a box from Harbor Freight for somewhere north of three hundred bucks, and assemble it at home. But do you realize how much beer (or scotch, or good bourbon) $300.00+ can buy?!?

 

With the exception of quite small boats, a wooden trailer isn't practical for several reasons, though weight is a primary concern. This coupled with the fact you'll have a lot of difficulty getting a title and registration for it in many states, leads one to accept metal as the way to go.

This is an old thread. The comments of heat and welding weakening metals shows a lack of understanding. I recently spec'd up a metal cruiser recently. It's plating is scheduled for replacement in 25 to 30 years and the general rule of thumb is 1% per year of plating thickness lose, just to corrosion. That's right, if you leave the plating on her for 50 years, it'll be half as thick as it was when built. Now, this include a safety margin, but is typical of metal builds, incorporating enough material thickness to compensate for it's "issues". The same approach is applied to welded attachments.

 

Building a trailer is like building a boat. Document with receipts, plans and photos and you should have no problem at the bureaucrat's desk.

 

There are several states that do not permit wooden trailers. Too many broken tongues and frames I suspect.

 

It would be interesting to see where some of them draw the line. For example, what if you have a wood-framed trailer, with a metal tongue that extends through the middle of the trailer bed as a strongback?

But of course, there's a difference between 'interesting' and 'going to war with an entrenched bureaucracy'....

My guess is that California isn't a state that forbids wooden trailers. Or at least, it didn't used to. A neighbor parked a couple of them on my back lot 'temporarily' twenty years ago while he put his home on the market, then disappeared to Arkansas or some such place with the proceeds of the sale.

He didn't hand me papers for either one, but they had license plates on them. One I finally demolished; the other is the one I'm thinking about plundering for hardware to build a new one.