How to build a race car trailer

[nskyline34]

Hey every body. Newbie racer here again. As (most) you know I'm starting my road to racing and I'm a VERY big believer in do something right the first time. I'm looking into getting a trailer for hauling the karts around and I want something that will easily fit something like a FF or F2000 in it with room to spare for benches. I'm thinking something like a 24'x102" is that big enough? (yes with a ramp). Is that long enough or is 28' the right length? Also what are the basics you need in one of these? When doing land speed racing at the salf flats we had a welder, lathe, drill press and all kinds of things in the trailer. What do you guys find helpful and what have you found to be useless? I'm thinking mainly bench space and a welder and air compressor and a generator (running the air compressor to air tools). What else? bench grinder?

Thanks a ton fellas!

[robertkroll]

Hey every body. Newbie racer here again. As (most) you know I'm starting my road to racing and I'm a VERY big believer in do something right the first time. I'm looking into getting a trailer for hauling the karts around and I want something that will easily fit something like a FF or F2000 in it with room to spare for benches. I'm thinking something like a 24'x102" is that big enough? (yes with a ramp). Is that long enough or is 28' the right length? Also what are the basics you need in one of these? When doing land speed racing at the salf flats we had a welder, lathe, drill press and all kinds of things in the trailer. What do you guys find helpful and what have you found to be useless? I'm thinking mainly bench space and a welder and air compressor and a generator (running the air compressor to air tools). What else? bench grinder?

Thanks a ton fellas!

I have been using the same 28' trailer for the past 10 years. It's a bit cramped if you have big aspirations, but it has served my needs very well. One nice thing about it is that it isn't too heavy and it can be conveniently be towed by something as small as an F150 ford in a pinch (not in the mountains of course). My cummins dodge 2500 pulls it like its not even there.

I have owned about a dozen trailers in the past 25 years. Best advice is to buy quality, and think really hard what you will be using the trailer for in 5 or more years. Too many people have purchased the wrong trailer, and selling one is a very disheartening venture when you realize how much they devalue.

Best of luck.
-BoB

[racerdad2]

You'll definitely want the 28. You sound like a guy who wants a lot of spares, etc. at the track. Some guys do the minimal thing. Some guys the max. I think you're a max Be sure to check out the races in your area to scope out the multitude of trailers. You'll see some very good, creative solutions ! Please post photos when you're done

[Rick Kirchner]

I've never had the need for air tools at the track, and operate a FC out of an 18 footer. I never even use air tools at home on the car, except the die grinder and air riviter when doing fab OFF the car.

I have a small workbench with a vise that stores 2 sets of tires, car care stuff, fluids, work lights, gears, and alignment equipment, and a roll-away toolbox across the front.

There's a set of cabinets above the workbench that hold, literally, every piece of spare junk that's ever come off the car sans exhaust system. Everything is packed in small shipping boxes and labelled.

Along the sidewalls I have a ez-up, carpet roll, folding table, spare nose and front wings, spare rear wing, 3x five-gallon fuel jugs, a step stool, and a ABS drainpipe with long stuff in it.

I still have room to hang another 2 sets of tires, my crane, and rolling stand, and suspension pieces along the walls if I decide to go that route.

I have a tongue box (truck bed box) that holds various wood cribbing, a tire machine, and a go-ped pit scooter.

I could see a 20 to 22 footer if you wanted to haul a full-sized motorcycle in front of or behind the car, but I wouldn't know what to do with a 28.

The difference between flats stuff and weekend SCCA is that the flats are once a year, a long, long way from anything, and the cars are massively over-designed given the risks of failure at speed. So I guess I understand the lathe, drill press and welder thing there. The event also gives plenty of time to do that stuff.

IMHO, if you need that kind of stuff to do fab/repair during a typical race weekend you would be better off improving pre-race prep.

[brownslane]

I have bought them and built them. For the materials costs you can buy an enclosed trailer and save 800 hours! By the time you buy (retail) the axles, wheels, wiring, tubing, spring setups, ramp door parts, side door hinges/locks, etc, siding, rivets, lighting parts, flooring and side wood, you could have bought one and save a year's worth of work

Check places like racing junk. That is where I bought my 34 Pace for a third of new. Drove down there, picked it up. It had everything I needed (except genset and cabinets), everything was new (tires, bearings, fresh paint). I drove over 2,300 miles and no problems. I paid $4,000 LESS than the 24-footer I built for myself ten years earlier.

I would never squander my time building something I could buy for less.

The only person in the world who build a better-than-storebought trailer is Jon Staudacher. He is one in a million and (apparently) doesn't need sleep

Used trailers, in good shape, sell for 50% of new. Considering trailer builders make less than 10% margin on their products, you are buying yours with a 40% discount over the materials and labor.

Save your efforts to build cabinets, scale pads, build in a genset, install 110V lighting and run air lines. Those are things that you can do easily, simply and inexpensively. They are also the items that cost the most if you pay somebody to to them for you.

...And I am one of those guys who drags everything to the track; I always found if I left something behind, it would be the part I needed. Hence the 34-footer. But it also makes a GREAT storage unit for me over the winter

Best of luck!

[nskyline34]

Thanks for the replies guys. All great input and varying aspects too. And yes, if I could afford a second car I'd drag it along and a third car in boxes just in case! I'm starting the process of selling both my car and truck to buy something like a 1998.5-2004 cummins. So I'm not too worried about weight. I think I will start shopping around on racingjunk and see what they've got. Also, what are the bennifits (quantitative) of a v-nose vs the usual flat brick?

[racerdad2]

A bit less drag & more inside storage my trailer is 32'. I can haul the formula & our race karts (six) dirt bike, atv & more stuff than I can remember, plus with the roof air & heat, it's comfy & sleeps well. Has a frudge, as well I store my boat in it during the winter ! I pull it with an F250 with a chipped 7.3, 10 to 12 mpg ! I'm guessing it too out at 9k #'s.... The cummins will rock.

[racerdad2]

BTW... add rear air bags to your truck

[lancer360]

Decision on trailer I think comes down to what you want as a pit vehicle. Small ATV or motorcycle/scooter and 24' of floor space will be plenty for a single car and plenty of spares with cabinets/shelving installed. If you want a golf cart size pit vehicle then you probably need to step up to 28' of floor space (28' bumper pull or 32'-36' gooseneck/5th wheel). 32'-36' gooseneck/5th wheel win hands down over a 28' bumper pull. I recently upgraded to a 36' 5th wheel enclosed car hauler and I can't believe how much better it pulls than a bumper pull trailer. They do cost a bit more, but a 36' will give you the same floor space as a 28' bumper pull plus an extra 8' of attic space. A 32' will give you 24' of floor space plus the 8' attic for storage. You would be surprised on how much you can get up in the attic space, just be mindful of the load on the rear axle of the truck. The attic space can save you the money of installing cabinets/shelving that you would need for spares with a bumper pull trailer. With the extra storage space of the gooseneck/5th wheel a 32' might be plenty of trailer for a single car plus golf cart depending on the length of the car. Might only need to take the nose off the car to make it all fit. I have found that the 5th wheel/ gooseneck trailers get 1-2 MPG better than the bumper pull trailers. It has to do with the aero of the wind going up and over the truck and then hitting most of the front of the trailer versus the attic area fills in the aero "hole" behind the truck so you don't get that double frontal area penalty. Some of that will depend on how closely you can get the attic to fit up to the rear window of the truck. Bumper pull trailers do react quicker when backing them up, but you have to be careful as the load distribution hitches don't like backing at sharp angles and you can't turn them as sharply. A 5th wheel/gooseneck can be turned around inside the length of the trailer if you have the proper hitch for your attic size and truck combination. Even though I have the shortest bed in the industry (6'3") for a 3/4 ton truck, I can still turn my 102" wide trailer past 90 degrees which makes it very easy to maneuver.

Last year we took my 36' aluminum 5th wheel to Daytona with two F600's in it and enough spares to rebuild 1.5 cars, a spare engine, two car lifts, 3 rolling tool boxes, a wheeled generator, two easy ups, 6 sets of tires, and a bunch of other stuff I'm probably forgetting. We were slightly over on the rear axle of my '06 Ram 2500 Cummins Megacab so we rearranged some of the spares to the back of the trailer for the trip home. Gross combined weight was 20K and the truck did a wonderful job pulling it from Charlotte to Daytona and back. Truck wise I would seriously look at the '06+ Dodge compares to the '04. I believe it was in '06 that the trucks got a major update and the interiors are much quieter than earlier models. '06+ you can't really go wrong with Dodge, Ford, or Chevy. Chevy has better tranny, Ford has the better chassis/interior, Dodge has the best engine/gas mileage. While earlier 6.0L Ford's had huge problems, the later 6.0L was a good engine and had fewer warrenty claims than the 7.3L did. Damage was done to the rep of the engine though so most people think all 6.0L Ford's are bad engines.

[Charles Warner]

Don't worry about air compressors and plumbing. Mount a large nitrogen bottle, get an appropriate regulator and Shrader valve if doing shocks, and air hoses to reach the car. Air tools are cheap at Harbor Freight and come in handy when needed. You rent the tank and trade in when empty. Very economical way of having air capability.

[racerdad2]

Ford truck, Cummins engine, Chevy tranny & a fifth wheel. Now, we're talkin ! If you do get a bumper pull with load distribution, a must, be sure to lube the load bars every time out. Makes the turns much easier

[gcoffin]

1. The primary function of the trailer is to deliver the race car to the track. I solo towed to the RunOffs at Road Atlanta (and back in a 1.9lt Misibushi truck) and I must admit that when they pitted me next to an enclosed trailer with a stacker system that could carry 4 cars my humble single axel open trailer looked a bit small, but both rigs achieved the goal of getting the car to the track. To me trailers and tow vehicals are comfort and convinience items and are in a seperate column from race car necessities. To put it another way for the cost of buying an enclosed trailer, outfitting it with all the bells and whistles and getting a diesel to tow it all you have just spent the price of a nice FC ot FF.

2. Old age is the primary reason I finally went to an enclosed trailer. The determining factors were secure storage of tools and equipment and the convienence of not having to load and unload everything, every race.

3. So how big? 16x7 is minimum. this will give you enough room for the car and cabinets/tool boxs across the front. Make sure the car will fit thru the doors. 20-24 seem to be the most common and will have a higher re-sale value.

4. I use 2 rolling tool boxes secured across the front of the trailer. I originally built in cabinets but spent to much time loading, unloading and running in and out of the trailer to get tools. Now we winch the boxes in, roll them out at the track, winch them back in at the end of the weekend and roll them out into the garage when we get home........took me many years to discover the wheel.

5. Paint the inside of the trailer white and put in a decent floor.

6. get a winch for loading and unloading

7. if you think you need a generator get a quiet one so your pit mates will not hate you

8. get an electric tounge jack........choke your wheels! before use.

9. become creative with e-track products

10. bring the car to the track ready to race and you will not need welders or air tools, just a good set of tools, any special tools peculiar to your car and line up equipment for minor tweaks or checking in case there are any incidents, like bouncing around mowing the infield.

10. use test and tune days for tuning the car, race weekends allow very litle time for this. My observation is the people doing normal between session checks at races are almost always running in front of people trying to "tune for speed" by working on their set up. That said I always encourage people in my class to change their set ups on a regular basis between sessions and use the maximum amount of wing

11. Oh yeah get an equalizer hitch......

btw our current set up is a 97 powerstroke F250 Crewcab with a 28' trailer. 13 foot self contained, air conditioned living quarters and 15' in the back for the FC.......cost the equivalent of about three seasons of running the minimum number of races to compete for the ICSCC championship.

[brownslane]

Greg, that pretty well summarizes it! Well said.

I purposely built a new tool box (war wagon) using all my shop tools, then building in the cabinet space, wheel chocks etc in the trailer to accommodate it. By using the same tools located in the same drawers that I use every day in my shop makes it a lot easier for me to find things at the track. It is on wheels and comes out of the trailer, sets up under the awning and stays there until it is time to go home. Everything I need for track use (special tools, spare nuts,bolts, marking paint, etc) is built into the box. No running in or out of the trailer, no plastic bins to dig into to look for things. Everything right where it needs to be.

The down side is that the toolbox is 52 inches high, 7 ft 6 inch long and 38 inches deep...and (probably) weighs 1,500 pounds! I load it in and out of the trailer with the golf cart....but it allow me to do everything needed to the car myself with the least amount of running around. A properly set up enclosed trailer will make the difference between a clean, organized and well prepped car at the track and during the weekend...especially if you are a one man band.

Regards,

[lancer360]

I'll second the nitrogen bottle. The really big bottles you can only rent but the next size down you can buy. I bought one and a regulator and one tank full will last the full season filling up tires and occasionally filling up tires on the street cars or competitors tires. I also like the idea of the rolling toolbox. I have one of the giant Harbor Freight upper and lower cabinet ones and it works well. No trying to transfer tools back and forth between the garage and home and I know where every tool is. I use a winch to pull mine in and out of the trailer and e-track strap it to the wall butted against the front of the trailer. Unpaved tracks it stays in the trailer, but at paved tracks it is really nice to have it right by the car.