Small Off-Road Supplies Trailer

So I came up with the idea to turn the kart from my old Kohler generator into a neat little trailer to take with us when we go wheeling way back in the woods somewhere for a long while.



The idea was to just to take the front caster out and make a tongue that bolts into the same spot that the caster did.

Got the caster removed:



Started making the tongue out of some round tube steel:





Bolted it up and added some bracing to stop the small angle steel there from flexing with weight on the trailer:



Got a couple little tool boxes laid down on there, they fit pretty darn good:





Just got a tarp strap holding them down, should be good enough.

Here's the tonuge setup:





I made it this way so I can pull the pin out and flip the end of the tongue upside down, as the draw bars on some of the other tractors are quite a bit lower. Should work nice to keep the trailer mostly level with any of the rigs pulling it.

I'm liking the idea of this little unit so far though, I'm planning on keeping the fuel tank to re-fuel the tractors while off-roading. Just gotta find a way to pump it outta there, maybe one of those big primer things for snowblowers or something. Also I'd definitely like to put some bigger wheels on it at some point. But yeah, should be a handy rig. Even with the tank and both tool boxes there's still a good amount of room for some other stuff to sit. Let me know what ya think!

cool idea, I like it. I have a idea for you for getting the fuel out. get you a small 12 volt air compressor, (which would be handy to have anyways for airing up flat tires) add a tire valve in the top of your gas tank and just pressurize it with the air compressor and it will push the fuel out the hose.

Cool trailer. You could make the tongue pivot on the frame, that would be nice for going round sharp corners and avoid jack knifing. For getting the fuel out of the tank, you could use a manual fuel pump like this one to siphon it into a tractor tank.

Creepycrawler wrote:

cool idea, I like it. I have a idea for you for getting the fuel out. get you a small 12 volt air compressor, (which would be handy to have anyways for airing up flat tires) add a tire valve in the top of your gas tank and just pressurize it with the air compressor and it will push the fuel out the hose.

Thanks CC! That's a neat idea with the air pump actually. I do have this little guy here I could use for that:





It's just got the 12v plug for you car, but I'm probably gonna cut that off, put some alligator clips on the ends, and add a toggle switch. That way I could just hook it up to the battery of any of tbe tractors. Thanks for the idea! Haha.

MatthewD wrote:

Cool trailer. You could make the tongue pivot on the frame, that would be nice for going round sharp corners and avoid jack knifing. For getting the fuel out of the tank, you could use a manual fuel pump like this one to siphon it into a tractor tank.

Thanks Matt! Yeah that little pump thing looks just like the one I was talking about. It'd work good for sure, but I'm kinda liking CreepyCrawler's idea so I'm gonna try that and see if it works.

Man I'd love something small like this.  Seems like I always need a chainsaw on the trails I ride.

You should definitely add a milk crate for throwing odds and ends in.

I was going to suggest a cordless drill with a pump on it but honestly, I think putting on a good ole gas can held down with a bungie would be the simple and easy way to go.

Yeah that would be simpler, but the cradle to hold the fuel tank in place is welded to the frame, so I figured I'd just leave it instead of cutting it all off. Haha.

Alrighty so I got some stuff done today. I got some small clamps hooked up to the leads on the compressor:



Then for pumping out the fuel I drilled the vent hole in the fuel cap bigger and pressed in a valve stem that I cut apart.



Works good! It pumps the fuel right outta there, haha. Might take a couple seconds to fully pressurize when the tank is close to emtpy, but that's no big deal. So now I just gotta get a length of fuel line coming off the fitting to I can get the fuel into the tanks on the tractors.

I just used one of the old generator mounts to bolt the little compressor down:





Fits in there pretty good! Had the little trailer hooked up to the GT and the leads for the compressor are easily long enough to reach the battery even while the trailer is still hooked up, so that's pretty handy. Let me know what ya think!

Glad the plan worked out! nice work.

Thanks Carl!

wow you work fast, thats really cool, glad it worked out for you. I had another idea for your trailer, do you have a hand crank winch laying around you could mount to the top bar on the back of the trailer and use it like a tow truck if you have a mower lose a wheel or break down?

Thanks man! Yeah that tow truck idea actually crossed my mind at one point, and it'd probably be pretty handy. If I ever did that though I'd wanna upgrade the wheels because I don't trust them to hold that kinda weight. Shouldn't be hard to do that though, there's bound to be some old wheels lying around here I could use.

Yes I love the winch idea.  Just put on some bigger tires as far back as you can put them so the load of the towed tractor will be closer to them.

Yeah it'd be pretty handy for sure. We'll have to see if I can rig something up here maybe, haha.

Very cool idea. I have used pressure to push gas before, but not like this.

Thanks! I'm hoping it proves rather effective on the next trip, haha.

Turned out pretty neat

Thanks mr.mod!

Like the trailer/mobile gas station/future tractor tower, LOL. good idea with the air compressor too.

Thanks! Haha, yeah no kidding, pretty much got a little mobile service station here.

I'm new here and not sure about replying, etc,
But I built a trailer something similar in form of little cycle trailer, kept it low to the ground with 8 inch tires.

I added fenders and a skid bar at about a 45 degree angle in the front and rear of the wheels and when going through the woods if it encounters a tree going towards the tire/fender it will just slide around the tree. Really handy for hauling deer, tree stands, deer feeders and feed and I use it around the house for hauling rotor tillers, fill dirt, rocks, etc.

The trailer is roughly about 2 ft wide (same width as a Yamaha Big Bear and about 4 ft long. I can go thru the woods at day or night and not have to be concerned about the tires/fenders hanging up on any obstacles. It just skids around the trees, bushes, etc.

If crossing a deep ditch the rear of the trailer is free to just drag. I have a receiver type hitch on the Yamaha 350 Big Bear.

Yeah the nerf bars in front of the wheels is a pretty good idea, I might have to rig up some of those on this little rig at some point.

Anyways I got a good length of line run off the fuel tank outlet, and finally got a chance to try re-fueling a tractor when I ran the ol' B-110 outta gas:



Works great! Doesn't pump out super fast or anything, but it still gets the job done just fine. Now I'd like to try and find a way to hide the pump line and the leads coming off the compressor so they won't get snagged by branches or anything.

thats cool man, love seeing it in action, especially helping out the old Allis

Thanks man! Yeah I'd say I couldn't have found a better test subject!

Well as it turns out I don't ever end up bringing this little rig with me when I go out wheeling, so it hasn't seen much use other than me grabbing tools out of it.

Yesterday though I made a nice spot for it to sit inside the tractor shed, and I then decided to put the front caster back on so I could roll it around wherever I needed it.



The only other thing I did was weld onna little pocket for the end of the fuel filler hose to sit in:



Works well! It should be handy to be able to roll this little unit around the shed now.

Nice, looks like it will be pretty handy as a cart.  Maybe a work surface up top that can be removable?

Hey now there's an idea! I might just have to look into doing that now, haha.