Guess what?!

[Paddler Ed]

It's going to be fairly self explanatory why I'm posting in here... I've just joined the forum!

I've had a good poke around here, looking at ideas (some more appropriate than others) for building my own trailer, so I thought it was a good opportunity to join up.

I've been lucky enough to see lots of variety in trailers through work, so I had some ideas as to what I wanted it to do - mainly be compact, light and the same track as the tow vehicle (currently an old 4Runner, and is likely to stay that way for the forseeable future... or until I can afford a Prado)

So, about me... I'm a daft Pom who has just finished a Masters degree at University up in Northern NSW, and now find an empty space in my world - dissertation and research filled that quite nicely, but that's now done, I have a challenge vacuum. Therefore, in a bid to fill this I've been designing my own trailer... I've got a mate who is a boilermaker (about 30 years experience) so that's the welding sorted; mechanicals? I'm self taught, but have done the cylinder heads on the car, and a whole load of other bits and pieces, so that part is not too much of a worry, as well as looked after enough trailers in the past that they don't worry me too much...

Originally the idea came from the Gordigear Xtreme Off Road trailer, which I have since found is very similar to the early Track Trailer models (such as the Eagle)... therefore I must be going on the right lines somewhere along the way! I'm aiming for small and compact, both as a trailer and set up - I don't want a massive thing to sort out, so the Taiga tent from Gordigear looked a good size, whilst the trailer is going to be about 3.6 metres long, 1.75m wide and 1.35m (ish) high, which means it's a bit longer than a Patriot x1, but narrower and lower (I'm not sure how it compares to the Track Eagles though); my sums tell me that this should weigh in at about 490kg with 80 litres of water on board, so I'm thinking I might aim for 750kg max weight and run it unbraked. Attached is the design I'm working on... not high tech (I tried to use Sketch-up etc but didn't get on with it, so MS Word did the trick!)

I'll have a load of questions to go in the "My Camper Trailer Build" section and hopefully clear up some aspects of the planning and actually get it going!

Ed

[KingBilly]

Hey Ed, welcome to myswag.  Good luck with your trailer build.

Happy camping
KB

[Trailer Bloke]

G'day Ed enjoy the forum good luck on your build look forward to seeing some photos.

[Sixpack]

Welcome Ed, lots to learn on this site mate.