How to Shorten Semi Trailer...

Oh man, i was looking for a youtube video of someone hitting an over pass based on your title. that's not nearly as funny lol.

I've never shortaned a trialer, but i would imagine water proofing it wouldn't be easy.

 

Just be ready to block the floor up in a couple of spots so it doesn't fold on you. But what you said sounds like it should work. Good luck

 

Do you have any pics of the trailer. That can turn into a very complicated task. Possible, but it will not be easy.

 

For the time and effort involved id just buy a city grocery trailer. They are much shorter than your otr trailers due to all those grocery stores in sections of towns that were not designed for truck traffic. they are also usually only 96 inches wide. Can pick them up all day long for under two grand. I've got one I use for storage that I only gave 500 bucks for.

 

what a trailer? dry box? really not so easy. roof is made of plasrtic sections sealed with polyurethane, so u have to cut one section from other , and it is easy to damage roof sections removing it. to remove 48' lenth roof is very difficult becouse it will collapse and be useless.

to cut ore enlarge refers is much easier becouse its walls and roof are tought.

Sometimes it u need unusual si\e trailer it is easier to purchase flatbed and bild dry box ore tint trailer on its chassis.

Other good idea- use container chassis, put 40' ore 45' container on it and cut/weld it. Steel containers are tought and easy to convert, that's why here in Ukraine some companies make custom truck bodies of used see containers to fit it on BDF truck (changeble body truck) ore to container chassis

 

I would just buy a trailer made to you specs. for two reasons, the first is this is a lot of work, just stop by a trailer repair place and watch them repair a wall or roof and you'll see why I say this. The other one is that the trailer's use history matters a lot, there are things done to a trailer which many times it should be scrapped. I had seen floors get soft, and other things where it makes it unsafe even if it passes an inspection. We have a family friend who used an old converted trailer for his horses and was bringing home his prized mare and buggy when there was an accident with the floor of the trailer, the horse fell through a hole in the floor that was rotted and they ended up being put down right there on the side of the road. He learned a hard lesson, and from what I understood one reason why a lot of these old abused trailers fail when re-proposed for other things is because of the undetected rot in the floors.

If you are still convinced into converting one, then look at the postal services surplus, they have a lot of small 40 foot 12'6" trailers they use and it seems they can't keep them all.

 

Yes you are forgetting something. The rear header and doors will all need to be shortened. The rear header could be a tough cookie. With time and money nothing is impossible.

 

Why not just buy an old horse trailer and build your living quarters in the front section? We bought one from sallee in ocala for dirt cheap back when they switched over to 53's.