I have a Harbor Freight trailer with the 12" wheels. It's a good
platform to build your dream trailer on. Some caveats though:
The bolt holes on one of the fenders started fatiguing and the fender
was well on its way to tearing off. I solved this by putting metal
plates between the bolt heads and the fenders, sort of like a giant
set of washers.
The way the license plate is attached, the license plate holes tend to
fatigue. I noticed this on my way out the driveway to the Tour at
Castle.
The solution to the license plate problem is not to flip the license
plate bracket over and attach the plate by it's bottom holes above the
taillight. If you do that, the bracket holding the taillight will
probably fatigue and break off, dangling the taillight assembly
against the back of the wheel as you zoom zoom down the highway at 70
miles per hour. Don't ask me how I know. I think you know the answer
already.
I had a friend weld the trailer frame together once I had it
assembled. It makes the frame more rigid and helps prevent fatigue in
any of the bolt holes that hold the trailer together. In retrospect,
this was an excellent idea.
After you weld on the trailer, brush-on paint is probably preferable
to spraypaint. That is, unless you like sneezing in technicolor.
Plan to mount your wheels flat on the trailer rather than sitting
vertically between frame rails, no matter how elegant the latter
seems. 205 width Kumhos will fit just fine, but if you upgrade to
wider tires or wheels they might not fit anymore.
The trailer is cheaper at the retail store. So is the spare. Get a
spare. Make sure it's the same diameter as the tires that come with
the trailer (not super critical since it's a spare, but it would be
nice).
Sean, you just need to be more alert. I don't think M.J. ever puts his
top up, Scot probably has his down most of the time, and they both
have trailers. You haven't seen me in top-down trailer mode because
I think it's perfectly reasonable to travel to nearby events on Kumhos.
--
john@idsfa.net John Stimson
http://www.idsfa.net/~john/ HMC Physics '94
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