Trailer Re-Fit

Yesterday at 03:42 AM1 day

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My old Army buddy left me his trailer when he and his wife moved out to South Carolina back in 2019, he retired from the Army a few years before, then retired again from his civilian contractor work at Twenty Nine Palms Marine Corp Base here in SoCal. He and his wife had a dream to follow, he loved cars and motorcycles, and she loved traveling, and together they were going to live out the rest of their lives doing things, and having fun, sadly he passed away in 2020.

As some of you know, my wife and I are moving out there as well, we are staying with his wife for a couple months while we find our own place to live.

His trailer that he left me is a good trailer. One of the things he mentioned when he gave it to me was that it was built by a small shop, to his specs, he would load up his bikes side by side in this trailer, he was a Harley man. So he ordered the trailer 5' x 8', instead of the standard 4' x 8'. He had also mentioned at the time that the frames was all welded, no bolts, not a single one holding this trailer together, the only bolts you'll find on the frame are for the license plate and the hydraulic stand on the tongue, other than that, it's completely welded, 3" square galv tubing for the chassis, 1" square galv tubing for the rails.

Here she is in the rough, it's been sitting a long time, I used it as lumber storage, till now. It has the original 5/8" CDX installed.

I stripped it bare to the frame.

Before I started replacing the lumber, I checked the wiring, re-wrapped it, made sure the lights worked, and I knocked it down quickly with some sandpaper and rattle canned it primer gray just to give it a fresh look, and I have the first sheet of ply down, with it's accompanying 12" strip to make that 5' wide deck.

You can see the furring strips I cut to install under the rail inside so I can float the sides above the rail a foot taller. The OG trailer had the sides below the rails as you can see above, my modification will be a taller, and enclosed box.

I rattle canned some truck bed black texture spray on the deck, that's why it's black in color now, I also painted the bottom of the plywood deck before I installed it, so it'd be road wet resistant on the underside.

First panel in place

Side panels installed, without my prompting, my doggy Lady jumped right in and had a seat, she wouldn't budge!

All sides installed

Roof installed. I have 2x3's framing the perimeter of the roof on the inside and the roof is glued, screwed and tattooed in place, so hopefully it'll withstand 65 mph fwy speeds. I used exterior Liquid Nails, and screwed down every six inches. I used deck deck screws, drove them in flush, and I went over each screw head with Bondo and 3 coats of exterior paint for the roof.

Looking good!

I'll install 3/4" aluminum corner to the entire top perimeter as seen below.

What really stood out to me is how well built this trailer is, not only the materials used, but the craftsmanship is wonderful, the welds are clean, and the entire trailer is square, I aint kidding, it's square, all my panels went in flawlessly, nothing uneven to fight with, and everything joined up where it was supposed to join up. The builder did a great job.

Tomorrow I'll finish it with some doors on the rear and I'll post some of those images too. I was going to put what needed to go in the trailer in, and screw a back panel on for the trip, so nothing comes out of the trailer till we get to our destination. But my wife reminded me we'll be going through customs and border patrol check points, and we are thinking that a secured rear panel, without access could raise suspicion of smuggling, so we opted for double doors that can be opened by customs and border patrol.

I bet my ol buddy is smiling down on this!

Thank for following!

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