Calling all trailer gurus

[Kaos116]

Hello everyone,
I am in need of a little guidance. I picked up a trailer. This one to be exact....






After a little work I ended up with this...






And of course this...






When I started looking the frame of the trailer over I noticed one of the cross braces was slightly bent at the point the spring attaches. If you look at the top left spring connection point you can see the bend.






Upon further inspection I found a repair/weld. It appears that the weld is only a spot weld of sorts and doesn't go all the way up the cross member.






The question, What should I do about it? Should I try and bend the bend out? It seems that it would naturally try to bend itself out with weight on the trailer.

Your thoughts?

Thanks,

Todd

[Micro469]

Todd... to be on the safe side, I would take it to a welder and have a new crossbrace put in. You really don't want to have it break while going down the highway... Also, because of the bend... are the wheels still aligned?

[jay]

that would concern me. the axle should be parallel to the car's axles. i think you would invite handling problems, premature bearing failure, and tire wear if it isn't.

[SteveH]

I'm with John....I'd replace it, and since it has bent once, I'd replace it with something more substatial, but that's just the way I am.

[Kaos116]

Yup, it's gonna be replaced. I went out this morning to do a little paint stripping and I found that it is cracked. Under a couple coats of paint was a crack that ran to the top of the beam AND both ends that connect to the outer perimeter are cracked.


This is what it looked like after the paint had been removed.




Then I found these!!!





The bright side of it all is that I wasn't 100% happy with the axle width and placement. So, while the welder is replacing that crossbeam I'll get him to move the spring hangers!

I'll end up with a trailer that will be safe and happy with.

Thanks everyone for your input.

Todd

[Dale M.]

With what you are finding, I would go over chassis really good and wire wheel or sand any area in question, and if you find things you do not like, mark it with chalk or dab of paint so welder fixes ever place in question...

Dale

[JunkMan]

Todd,

I wouldn't worry too much about a couple of cracks, considering that the frame is probably 20 years old or more. Once you get all of the cracks and such welded/fixed up you should have a great frame to build on.

A teardrop body will add a lot more strength to the trailer than the pop up body did (if it added any strength, considering that one side had the door in it, with an open top).

Unlike most of us that overbuild our trailers, the trailer companies make their frames as light as possible, while still being strong enough to do the job at hand. I'm amazed at how light some of these frames are, and they still hold up to decades of use (and abuse).

[Miriam C.]

Tod
Your trailer looks a lot like mine. I had some broken welds and had them fixed. Truth is there are some building without all that metal. Build a floor and attach the walls and it will go till you drop a few thousand pounds on it.

[Kaos116]

Yes, It's going to get beefed up a bit. I am thinking that the two cross beams that the springs will mount to, to go with 2x3 1/8". Right now it's just that thin c channel. Also mounting them on the bottom of the 2x3 instead of on the upper part of the c channel is going to give it a bit more height.

As a bit of a follow on question. How much does a spring compress at say 1000 lbs? or 2000lbs? If I can remove the need for a wheelwell because the floor height is high enough that would be great. I wouldn't need to go with a wider axle, I would just have to move it back a bit.


Thanks,

Todd