Flatbed Trailers with Arched Floors?

Aluminum trailers like the ones Ive had had a curve built into them. A small curve nonetheless. Put a massive coil on the center of that curve and it flattens out nicely.

Steel flatbeds like Fontaine don't feel those coils. You can toss em on there and chain. Those trailers don't care.

Now what you do need to keep track of is the floor boards. If they start breaking apart or coming off the skeleton of the trailer and so on you replace them with like sized wood.

 

Proper term is arch

 

Aluminum trailers flex a lot more than steel so they build in a positive arch to compensate so they don't sag in the middle.

Some places that ship long flat objects don't want aluminum trailers for this reason. sometimes you can use dunnage to support the item and fill in the gap between the trailer arch and the load.

 

Built That way on purpose... Add weight they flatten out... If they weren't arched they would sag under heavy load.

 

And not Archie.

/Tease...

 

My company just bought some new 2020 53 foot east trailers. The arch in em is frickin huge. But man do they pull nice and smooth.. I had 20k on both axles on my spread pulling rebar up from az to utah and it rides like a dream

 

They put that there so you don't have to put dunnage in the middle, just on each end, save the trees and all that, c'mon.

 

I've never once NOT had dunnage in the middle. On light weight loads that are long, it's always larger dunnage front and rear and smaller in the middle. That is not to say "no dunnage in the middle" doesn't happen. Just that I've never seen it in over 10 years of flat bedding.

 

I do it every chance I get. If it don't flex (pipe, I beam, bars) when picked up in the middle Then it's 1 piece just in front of spread and 1 just behind dollies. Sometimes even closer when loading with a big Taylor with thick forks so he can get out.

Been to many times they put down 3 pieces and not have the front or back get enough weight to hold lumber in. Just seen this 2 or 3 days ago, truck going down the road with few pieces of pipe on and the 4x4 just getting ready to fall off back of trailer when a cop seen it and stopped him.