Donnie Johnson

Has anyone built a steel lugged trailer?

I am in the process of designing a unique trailer for cycle touring with my young family. It will have a single wheel and will be about as wide as my touring bike with panniers. I imagine that my trailer will look like the back half of a push bike, including the seat tube and rear stays. This way I can fit a rear rack and carry panniers on it.

Any advice would be awesome.

Donnie

JamesRL

There are devices, and I am struggling to remember the name, that look like what I imagine yours will, that have seats, handle bars and one rear wheel, and one rear wheel, that are used to take a toddler and pull them with your bike and teach them about riding. They attached onto the seat post and swivelled to make cornering easier. I did use one, many years ago, and it seemed to be a workable solution.

Perhaps you should take a look at how they work and then go from there.

Edited to add:

Here is what I was referring to: https://ontario.kijiji.ca/c-buy-and-s...AdIdZ580079729

Maybe take off the seat and mount something on the seat post?

fietsbob

seems like you have to make a joint twice , once for the lug , then again for the tube itself ..


Did you consider just buying an extrawheel instead? a lot less metal in it than your proposal ..

Extrawheel Bike Trailers | Bike Trailer Shop | Bike Trailer

it's all sorted .. just add Panniers ..

Then there's the venerable Jack Taylor's trailer design https://www.bikequarterly.com/images/GBwTrailer.jpg

reddog3

I was thinking along these lines- Trail-a-Bikes « Products « Trail-a-Bike

They are all over craigslist for cheap. Pull the cranks, chain and seat. Add rack and pannier mounts- you're ready.

MassiveD

There was a trailer a lot like what you are talking about that had one wheel and trailed a bar from which 3 sets of panniers hung. I used to have a picture of it, but somewhere along the line it got lost. It was by one of the major accessory brands like topeak, or chariot. Every now and then I look for it, just last week I went through all my old hard drives. It was unusual, and I have never seen anything like it since. The concept doesn't make much sense except I suppose if one had a lot of panniers around. Or if one was acting as a sag wagon for kids or clients who couldn't carry their panniers the whole way.

Andrew R Stewart 

Kool Stop made one of these trailers for a short while.

To the OP- Get a commercially made trailer (rent, beg, borrow or even buy) and try it out before spending the time to try building one. Andy.

MassiveD

Thanks Andy, that had been bothering me:

Here is one someone made for winter work with a 4" tire bike:




Someone has the original cool mule for sale on ebay uk for 250 pounds. Like this:



carries 100 pounds which is pretty good for a trailer.

ksisler

Hit amazon -- search for bike trailer