Alternate trailers for flatbed loads?

Luwi67,

Yes you are correct. I was once a used machinery buyer for a large dealer and would drive/fly to auction locations and buy machinery. They would then call in the movers and I would assist with rigging and loading.
Later I started my own company doing basically the same thing on a smaller scale and at locations where I wouldn't be competitive with the company that got me into it.

I'd love to do what you just said, but all this start up expense to be an owner/operator (near 10 grand without trailer + reoccurring monthly) will wipe me out financially. Just a few auctions a month isn't going to cover it I think.

I've looked into power only loads and most places I've found had a 2 year minimum requirement of documented OTR experience.... which I don't have despite 30 years of pulling one form of trailer or another (med-duty / hotshot...etc)

Even if I just deliver auction goods, I still pay mostly the same expenses (authority, insurance, DMV bond, trailer...etc) and I'm fighting to afford just those, so I'm trying to look at every option I can to make sure I can pay them.

As far as being "mobile", well I have the rest at an outdoor storage.

 

x1Heavy,

I won't make any excuses and I have quit before. As a former smoker you know that stressful times are the hardest and this last year has been pretty rough. All I can say is that I do appreciate your wise words and I will put attention to it as soon as I can. I hadn't considered the altitude issue and now I will.

As far as "taking it", I do not want to be a bottom feeder. I have been a business owner since I was 20 and always worked hard, but I was wiped out by a fire and literally have lived at truck stops for 18 months.
All I'm trying to do is to have some backup income while I try to start a new life and move towards a specialty type of trucking. It beats being on welfare since the male strip club won't hire me

 

x1Heavy,

That is some seriously detailed and great info' that I will reference back to once I get on the road. Thank You!

Bdog, I like that trailer a lot. It would be sort of an intermediate step up from a regular flatbed for my purposes, but I don't know how it would do as a substitute for a hydraulic beavertail? I'll explain below...

Casper, it's an interesting idea. I wish I had more experience in creative loading of one.

Ok, so lots of interesting trailer ideas. Let me explain why the whole hydraulic thing has been stuck in my head...

First, I used to own one. It is kind of a hard trailer to explain but I don't have pic's handy so...

It was a 48' hydraulic single piece beavertail. 8' deckover, 30' main deck, 10' single piece non-folding beavertail (solid, not ramps). I pulled this with my FL-60 (Cat 3126).
The trailer had a flat (wood) 40' when the tail was up. Strangely, it was what I would call a medium duty trailer that was like a scaled down commercial trailer, not a consumer (read Big Tex) kind of deal. It was 2 axles of 19.5's. It also had hydraulic winch and landing gear...etc.

Now the key here in the machinery biz' is that you very often need to bring your own hard tire forklift with you to the job. Little hard tires don't play well with fold-over ramps and the forklifts can be pretty low so you have the "crest" to worry about clearing at the top of the ramp. Pneumatic and large tire forklifts can be dangerous when you're lifting delicate and awkward equipment through buildings and onto the truck even those those would clear the "crest".
Even if you could get it up the ramp, you would have to pull the forklift forward far enough to be able to fold the ramps, and frankly those ramps would really need plate welded on them for the small hard tires (which would make them darned heavy).

With my former trailer, the process was:

1. Load the forklift by driving it onto the ramp...
2. Lift the hydraulic ramp to it's level position (it was strong enough to lift 20k or more) and drive forward...
3. drive to location and offload forklift
4. Side load anything that would fit forward of the ramp (30 + 8 feet)
5. Put the forklift back on the ramp and raise it to level and go.
6. Reverse at destination.

Side perks are that it was a completely flat 40' without the forklift, and the ramps could be used to drag equipment onto the trailer using machinery skates (rollers) that couldn't be safely side loaded with the forklift. You could even use the hydraulics to "assist" by lifting a corner of something up if you needed to.

Now the big boys were all using the slightly larger Landolll /Trail King type with the 2 piece fold-under ramp. They had to account for a bit of forklift room on the deck since the ramp "went away", but their trailers were longer so I guess it balances out.

Of course you can also move other stuff on this kind of trailer... small excavators, concrete, rolled lawns, your mother-in-law's mini van or bedroom set...etc.

I think RGN's and lowboys are cool as heck, and from a trucking standpoint, I'd love to eventually own one, but I try to think about loading forklifts and CNC machining centers on one and the visualization is kind of strange to me even though I'm sure it's possible.
It's just that if you're going to include rigging and machinery hauling in your game plan, a nice flat deck and the ability to easily piggyback a hard tire forklift are kind of important.
In addition to that, if you're going to be a serious player in that biz', you're hoping to load and unload that trailer several times in the days following the auction or when moving someone's location.
A typical scenario might look like this:
The first client bought 2 forklifts, 3 drill presses, 5 pallets of tooling, and the 9' conference desk. He's going across town.
The second client bought this ###### vacuum forming machine that is 6 pieces connected by 200 hoses, fragile as heck, has computers attached to it, and is covered in silicone mold release spray. He's going into the next state.
The third guy bought the 20 ton gantry...etc.

Anyway, i guess that's why I'm kind of stuck on that type of trailer in the future.
The question still remains, can I make money with it taking generic loads if I buy it first instead of a standard flatbed or SD?
I'm wondering if the shippers will modify their shipments weights to suit a heavier trailer, and I'm wondering if that were the case, if the ratio of payload vs trailer would destroy any profit (based on the idea that they would pay you less because they loaded less, or alternately that permits or re-registration of the tractor for a heavier weight would be cost prohibitive?).

The bottom line is that I have to buy a trailer that is useable to the shippers and brokers and where there is almost always a load available.
At the same time it hurts to think about throwing 10 grand or more towards a trailer that doesn't fit my longer term goals if I don't have to. I'd rather put it towards the specialty trailer... but not if it will be restricted to specialty jobs because I can't gamble that right now.

I really appreciate everyone's thoughts

 

True cnsper. I have considered the sliding axle trailer as an option. It's a very clean solution once you modify your process to side load, then "tilt" down for the forklift load.

You are right about the forklift and roll back rental too. I have had to do this many times as an auction buyer when out of state. Locally though, I already own both a forklift and a roll back...and it is set up so the roll back can tow the forklift via the stinger (a nifty rig).

You do get to the heart of the matter though with your weight calc's. I will have to Google "divisible load" since these parts of the trucking side of things are what I'm not knowledgeable about.
I've heard I can re-rate the truck via registration to 105k as well, but I am currently still ignorant about the pitfalls of doing so if I wanted to use that sliding axle as a flatbed when the machine biz' is slow.