Looking for some tips regarding trailer construction!

[JennyC6]

I have a CA-10 and I'm lookin' to give it something to pull on. I don't want to remove the bed it comes with factory, so that rules out slapping a fifth wheel on and using anything off-the-shelf.

My design criteria:

* Bumper pull of some sort. Pintle hook? Lunettes? Effin' huge hitch ball? I'm leaning towards a pintle hook as that'd let me use a dolly and tow a normal semi trailer as well, should I find myself owning/building any.

* Able to carry 20-30 pounds as cargo cross country, perhaps as much as 50 on hard surfaces(I'll likely never own one but if this trailer can carry a legit car battery it'd be able to carry a proper full hydraulic digger)

* Full suspension. I realize itt'l be super stiff when it isn't loaded down but I want to be able to watch the axles moving around as it traverses rougher terrain.

* Somewhere around 30-40 scale feet in length seems about right. I did build a lego trailer of this length and it, while unable to carry anything heavier than a Tamiya grasshopper without bottoming out and being prone to literally falling apart, felt like about the right length for the truck.

* Two axles? Three? One?

* I'm thinking the axles should be positioned pretty much dead midships, both to help with maneuvering, and to minimize tongue load and thus minimize propensity to wheelie.

* Planning on running full height tires on it. Probably RC4WD Recaps on some spare CA-10 drive wheels/hubs(I absolutely adore how they bolt on with actual lug bolts!), but I might also use RC4WD Dayton dual wheels on it.

* Not looking for a full trailer, as I wanna be able to reverse this thing

* Capable of cross country haulage. Truck's boss at making its own roads and any trailer it tows should be able to go where the truck itself can go. I'll accept that the trailer likely won't be able to carry as much weight off-road as it will on-road, but it needs to be off-road capable.


Any tips and tricks for me? Part suggestions, perhaps? I'm struggling most with finding suitable frame rail stock(I kinda want to use actual steel so itt'l patina itself as I use it, truck'll be heavily patina'd both naturally and artificially to represent a beat up old farm truck). I've pondered grabbing one of those Hercules Hobbies trailers as a starting point and modifying from there, but building from scratch is certainly on the table.

Also, any hopups for the truck itself seem fitting? I'm figuring the ring-and-pinion in the stock axle won't hold up to the anticipated GVWR, as I've already stripped one ring gear without a trailer at all, but that's nothing a quick stop to SemiJoe's truck shop won't fix. Lesu axle bolts right in, never kill that, and I've already put an RC4WD Punisher driveshaft in it. Power's no problem, truck has a Castle Creations 5700kV brushless motor in the nose and a pair of 2s 50c 5000mAh Gens Ace lipos in parallel for propulsion. I have a feeling that powertrain would literally twist the frame if it got particularly angry!

[wolfws6]

Something like this?
http://rctruckandconstruction.com/showthread.php?t=8232

[JennyC6]

Something similar, yes. Mine won't be exactly the same, and may very well have a similar cargo area arrangement the truck itself has, but that's not very far removed from what I'm invisioning!

[sassgrunt]

I know that you're NOT wanting to add a fifth wheel to it, but just as food for thought; that's what I did to mine. I never really liked the short (white plastic) stake bed, and did want the tractor to pull a semi-trailer. I bought a second white plastic bed and then joined the two to make one that's now 24" long. Used the frame from a Tamiya flatbed trailer, but cut shorter and with only one axle. Also used a Tamiya fifth wheel for the tractor.
It approximates a ZIS-120, more or less.