Tire Trailers

[neurokinetik]

Originally Posted by jdv14476

Agreed. Still waiting for a testimonial about how well the Twins tow a small amount of weight. I have the same trailer and if I pack my personal gear in the car, there's no room for tires and tools. I believe that the car is quite capable of handling light weights behind, just asking to hear from experience.

I used to get 30mpg on long highway trips with the Miata towing a tire trailer (with 8 tires inside). It made pretty much no difference in MPG since I was turning almost 4000RPMs on the highway anyway. This in a car that made a dyno-verified 97ft-lbs of torque. The Toyobaru will be fine. If anything, it should be better when towing than it is without, as the extra weight at the back will actually make it better balanced, lol.

[VroomVroom]

[IMG][/IMG]

[IMG][/IMG]

[IMG][/IMG]
Riding around testing the tongue weight to about 60 lbs. The moment being created by the distance of the bikes away from the hitch may be too large especially in louisiana. There is a slightly noticeable deflection in the bolts as is to be expected. Deflection is better than a stiff bolt that would just snap. Id say the bikes cant be more than 15lbs each and the bike rack is 31lbs.


[IMG][/IMG]


This past week i tested my buddies jet ski (700lbs +fuel weight+200lbs trailer) around the block and it had no isssues. The tongue weight wasnt much and could effortlessly be lifted and manuevered with one hand.

This weekend i Will also be picking up a 420 lbs sea doo with a 200 lbs trailer With fluids and the bikes ill be strapping to it ill have around 720 lbs. Ill be driving it from Alabama to Florida and after playing around and launching sea doo a couple days ill be driving it 650 miles back to louisiana. Itll be safe to say this will be a pretty good test of its durability since the southern states have some of the most shitty roads.

[IMG][/IMG]

[Blu-by-U]

Perfect. Please post your thoughts and experiences when you get back. This idea is still just what the doctor ordered and I'll wait (impatiently) for your post, then I'll probably order one.

Originally Posted by VroomVroom

[IMG][/IMG]

[IMG][/IMG]

[IMG][/IMG]
Riding around testing the tongue weight to about 60 lbs. The moment being created by the distance of the bikes away from the hitch may be too large especially in louisiana. There is a slightly noticeable deflection in the bolts as is to be expected. Deflection is better than a stiff bolt that would just snap. Id say the bikes cant be more than 15lbs each and the bike rack is 31lbs.


[IMG][/IMG]


This past week i tested my buddies jet ski (700lbs +fuel weight+200lbs trailer) around the block and it had no isssues. The tongue weight wasnt much and could effortlessly be lifted and manuevered with one hand.

This weekend i Will also be picking up a 420 lbs sea doo with a 200 lbs trailer With fluids and the bikes ill be strapping to it ill have around 720 lbs. Ill be driving it from Alabama to Florida and after playing around and launching sea doo a couple days ill be driving it 650 miles back to louisiana. Itll be safe to say this will be a pretty good test of its durability since the southern states have some of the most shitty roads.

[IMG][/IMG]

[VroomVroom]

Originally Posted by jdv14476

Perfect. Please post your thoughts and experiences when you get back. This idea is still just what the doctor ordered and I'll wait (impatiently) for your post, then I'll probably order one.

Ill post back early next month. Wouldnt mind knowing the material grades so i could run some FEA on it before i leave though, i hate being a guinea pig.

[xwd]

I've got one I'm picking up from UPS today.

Yeah the bike rack kind of made me cringe a little bit. I definitely wouldn't want to be driving around on most crappy roads with that much tongue weight. I would only ever be towing a tire trailer with mine, there is really no tongue weight.

[mav1178]

Any info on when this will be available for sale?

-alex

[VroomVroom]

After 650miles and 13 Hours of driving on interstate and city roads, 3 successful launches and retrievals of my sea doo have left me with positive results on this tow bolt hitch. I believe its good to go, so go banannas or whatever people do.

The entire time the engineer in me said the shear is probably outrageous and the alternating forces would eventually cycle till failure with the uneven sections of road and drop offs after a crappy bridge. I took a gamble with a brand new sea doo falling off the back of my car and potentially causing a massive car pile up but nothing bad happened. That was incredibly stupid and was a bit stressfull to be honest but it ended well.

The conditions were as follows:
9K miles, stock brakes and original pads
Stock suspension, Stock Camber, stock tires(better mpg) and wheels.
Manual Transmission(helps to either stop faster or take stress of transmission) with motul 300 and 300LS in rear end.
450lbs(full tank) sea doo spark 2up,
250lbs(estimate) torsion axle trailer single PWC trailer with 12" tires.
Reese 2" Ball with 3/4" Shank
Reese1-1/4"x 9" 1-1/4" drop or 3/4" rise(used) Draw bar
Reese 1/2" Locking Bent Pin(almost in way of safety chains)

Handling/Maneuverability
The difference in handling and ability to steer with this load is a pretty significant change in feel. I felt very uneasy on higher speed turns and a slowdown was needed. However at no time on either the highway nor city roads did i feel as if it was unmanageable and was able to travel safely at speeds alternating between 60 - 75 mph. I was still able to quickly avoid things in road / change lanes without much swaying. On the more significant bumps/shitty roads the trailer saw some pretty significant jolts and did not bounce much at all. As a side note i intentionally got a trailer with a torsion axle because of the better handling characteristics and i highly recommend it. Backing up with the trailer required some practice but isn't bad at all.


Transmission:
This is speculation but if you have an automatic then i do not recommend a load this heavy because i have no idea how the transmission will shift with the added momentum but . You can absolutely feel the weight unless you are already moving on a flat road. The manual transmission just feels better in the 2.5K to 4K range and gets a bit clunky around those numbers especially if too much of a change in rpm is allowed during upshifting or downshifting. I tried two methods of driving and i felt that i would rather replace my brakes than my transmission so whenever slowing down i wouldn't downshift much and relied on my brakes to get to a stop. However if a quicker stop is needed heel toe is very useful.

Brakes:
The stock brakes are more than enough to stop this much of a load in a hurry. There is a noticable heavy feel whenever stopping and i am sure this will lead to more brake fading. I cant help but want an upgrade now.

Launching a Sea Doo:
With the tongue length i have the brz had to take a dip in the water. About 2-3 inches of water was on the wheels as a reference. The rear end and exhaust was dipped in water(salty/corrosive in this case). Nothing a good spray and scrub wont fix but it was needed for the salt content of the road/air anyway. My Nameless Stainless steel exhaust obviously had no issues. Other than dipping the brzs toes into the water i would say it was a painless process till i went to a slip with too much sand and almost got stuck if not for all this POWA and prius tires.


The looks i got from people on the road and at the boat launch was just priceless. Lots of people shaking there head and looking with either curiousity or disappointment. Have fun but drive safe everyone, ask me a question if you want but this is my first real review of anything so play nice.

[IMG][/IMG]

[IMG][/IMG]

[IMG][/IMG]

I have more pics of hitch components but do not have them available at moment.

[qoncept]

I've towed to probably a dozen events up to a couple hours away. I built my hitch very similar to kask2.0's. If I had it to do over again I wouldn't have had the vertical receiver like I do, I just would have added a 2" receiver welded to the bottom like every other hitch in the world. May still do it. But it works great, no issues.



See: http://www.ft86club.com/forums/showthread.php?t=38706

[Scooby South]

For those that have the Harbor Freight Tire Trailer.. and you want Bearing Buddy's on it. Harbor Freight doesn't have the right size.. I found some on etrailer.com that work. FYI ...

http://accessories.etrailer.com/search?w=2047ss

[bren5279]

Whatever happened to this? Are these available for sale at all?

[qoncept]

Originally Posted by bren5279

Whatever happened to this? Are these available for sale at all?

I think @kask2.0 is still selling them, and uhaul sells them now too.

[Slambert]

Originally Posted by bren5279

Whatever happened to this? Are these available for sale at all?

If you are talking about my hitch....Keep an eye on the Vendor area. I will be releasing information very soon.

[Blu-by-U]

Originally Posted by Slambert

If you are talking about my hitch....Keep an eye on the Vendor area. I will be releasing information very soon.

Any name or something to look for?

[bren5279]

And price?