Northern Tool 4x8 Steel & Aluminum No Longer Available

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Re: Northern Tool 4x8 Steel & Aluminum No Longer Available

Postby Esteban » Mon Apr 30, 2018 5:17 pm

Tractor Supply, Lowes and Home Depot sell utility trailers that could be used, with some modification, for building a teardrop trailer.

Unfortunately, the prices are much higher than the costs of trailers previously available from Red Trailer, Northern Tool and Harbor Freight.

:thinking: Maybe this is a market opportunity for a new utility trailer manufacturer and/or seller.

With the current, higher, prices for manufactured utility trailers, IMHO, the cost for custom built, or home built, trailers may be competitive.
Steve - SLO, CA
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Re: Northern Tool 4x8 Steel & Aluminum No Longer Available

Postby QueticoBill » Mon Apr 30, 2018 5:21 pm

Certain market opportunity for certificates of origin and labels to rivet on. 8)
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Re: Northern Tool 4x8 Steel & Aluminum No Longer Available

Postby Esteban » Tue May 01, 2018 1:11 am

Here are some 5' x 8' to 5' x 9' manufactured trailers that could be used, with some modifications, to build a teardrop trailer. They range in price from about $600 to $1212. The lower cost trailers have straight tongues that could/should be improved with additional diagonal bracing.

Load-Star-ATV-Trailer-Kit-5-ft-x-8-ft sold by Home Depot for $999

Northstar-Trailers-Sport-Star-5-ft-x-9-ft sold by Home Depot for $1212.49

Triple-Crown-1520-lb-Capacity-5-ft-x-8-ft-Utility-Trailer from Home Depot for $797

Carry-On-Trailer-5-ft-x-8-ft-Wire-Mesh-Utility-Trailer from Lowes is on sale for $599

carry-on-trailer-5-ft-x-8-ft-open-mesh-floor-utility-trailer from Tractor Supply for $749.99
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Re: Northern Tool 4x8 Steel & Aluminum No Longer Available

Postby Jdw2717 » Tue May 01, 2018 11:03 am

That's a shame. If I had known this was going to happen I would have bought a couple more. My first build was a trailer from Craigslist that had the rails and mesh floor. That was a lot of work to remove those before I built the cabin. My second is on a NT 5x8 trailer and it was much nicer to be able to spend an evening assembling that trailer and have it ready to go. The other took several weekends of grinding and painting.
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Re: Northern Tool 4x8 Steel & Aluminum No Longer Available

Postby TomMaj » Wed May 02, 2018 6:59 am

Just received an email from Northern Tool. The 5x8 trailer kit item # 37552 will be back in stock in June and appear on their website. it is not listed on the website because they are not taking back orders. The price will be $549.99 however there will be NO free shipping. I got a quote of $95 shipping to central PA.

That would be $150 more than when I got one 2 years ago @ $499 on sale with free shipping. Waddayagonnado....
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Re: Northern Tool 4x8 Steel & Aluminum No Longer Available

Postby greygoos » Wed May 02, 2018 12:45 pm

Good news. Thank you for following it up. On recent trip to Harbor Freight I asked about the trailers and the manager said he could give me a rain check but didnt know when they could honor it. In the meantime here is an idea.
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Re: Northern Tool 4x8 Steel & Aluminum No Longer Available

Postby 221B » Thu May 03, 2018 2:48 pm

I also contacted Northern Tool via email, and received this response about the 4 x 8 trailers. They indicated they would be available sometime in late June:

Thank you for contacting us.

Both steel and aluminum trailer kits will be shown again on the Northern Tool & Equipment website in the near future. Sorry for any inconvenience this has caused.

Please feel free to contact us if you have additional questions.


So, this should be good news, and I'm also wondering if Harbor Freight will follow suit?

At this point, though, I'm inclined to drive out to Peoria to pick up one made from Teske Mfg., as they are made in the USA, and appear to be of solid build, etc.
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Re: Northern Tool 4x8 Steel & Aluminum No Longer Available

Postby QueticoBill » Thu May 03, 2018 2:59 pm

221B wrote:I also contacted Northern Tool via email, and received this response about the 4 x 8 trailers. They indicated they would be available sometime in late June:

Thank you for contacting us.

Both steel and aluminum trailer kits will be shown again on the Northern Tool & Equipment website in the near future. Sorry for any inconvenience this has caused.

Please feel free to contact us if you have additional questions.


So, this should be good news, and I'm also wondering if Harbor Freight will follow suit?

At this point, though, I'm inclined to drive out to Peoria to pick up one made from Teske Mfg., as they are made in the USA, and appear to be of solid build, etc.


I agree about the Teske but I wish they made the manual available on line like NT did. That was helpful in planning.
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Re: Northern Tool 4x8 Steel & Aluminum No Longer Available

Postby Esteban » Thu May 03, 2018 4:17 pm

Teske Manufacturing's website www.teskemfg.com shows the different trailers they make. The 4' x 8' No Floor trailer may be good for building a 4' x 8' teardrop trailer.

Teske Mfr. is located in Springfield, Minnesota. The dealer locator shows dealer locations in ND, MN, IA, WI, and IL.
Teske's website says they "will custom-build models to suit your unique needs". They build 5' x 8' utility trailers. :thinking: I wonder if they could/would build 5'x 8' No Floor trailers, too?
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Re: Northern Tool 4x8 Steel & Aluminum No Longer Available

Postby Lithosis » Tue May 15, 2018 11:09 pm

The trailers are back on northern tool's website. :)
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Re: Northern Tool 4x8 Steel & Aluminum No Longer Available

Postby WizardOfOdds » Wed May 16, 2018 6:41 am

The trailers are back on northern tool's website.


Yes, but (at least as of few days ago when I last looked) they listed a 30+ day delay until they ship.
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Re: Northern Tool 4x8 Steel & Aluminum No Longer Available

Postby 221B » Wed May 23, 2018 7:23 am

I checked with Northern this morning (05-23-18), and they are now indicating that the 4x8 trailers won't be available until the beginning of August, with backorders only accepted via the 800 number.
This is a disappointment, as I hoped to get a start on my own build by now. I'm thinking I may go ahead and drive a few states away, and go with the Teske Trailer version of the 4x8.
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Re: Northern Tool 4x8 Steel & Aluminum No Longer Available

Postby cubbyboy57 » Fri Jul 13, 2018 1:00 pm

The Harbor Freight site has the folding trailers listed again. Looks like they are shipping again.
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Re: Northern Tool 4x8 Steel & Aluminum No Longer Available

Postby 221B » Wed Aug 08, 2018 5:32 am

cubbyboy57 wrote:The Harbor Freight site has the folding trailers listed again. Looks like they are shipping again.


This is certainly news!

Yesterday, we visited our local Harbor Freight and they indeed had both versions of the folding trailers in stock. I confirmed with the manager that they were originally pulled from sale due to a potential problem with the tires not meeting safety reqs.

Our particular HF store is not one of the really big ones, so there were not any on display. The reason I wanted to look at them was to compare them to the Teske Mfg. 4x8 models. We were in Peoria this weekend, so I was able to inspect a Teske model. It was less in cost than the Harbor Freight model, and it seemed very well constructed and welded together. Nice and beefy. Unfortunately, we live in New England, so we would have to drive half way across the 'States to the nearest Blain's Farm & Fleet in Illinois to purchase one.

At this point, from what I've seen, I'd probably go for the Teske model if one was available at least within a day's drive of us somewhere. Since they are welded together, it would cost more than the trailer to get it shipped to us.
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