Trailer Idea
 

Has anyone ever converted a child's trailer bike such as this http://www.amazon.com/WeeRide-96455-...3884026&sr=1-2 for use a touring trailer? I saw a woman this morning riding by with her son on a trailer bike. While watching them it occurred to me that the child's trailer bike might a good loaded touring trailer. The handlebars, seat and pedals could all be easily removed. A rack for panniers could easily adapted and installed. Possibly a set of custom crafted saddle bags could be made to drape over the attaching goose neck. A quick Internet search revealed quite a big price range for the trailer bikes. The one that I linked to above is $84.00 with free shipping. I am thinking that I may just give this a try. I am going to nose around locally and see if I can find a used one first at a good price. If anyone has any experience or thoughts on this I would really like to hear from you.

That sounds like a creative idea. You often see good trailer bikes going used for a reasonable price.

I doubt that it would be easy. You will have to do a bit of modifications. Besides the fact that it won't have any braze-ons (easily fixed with p-clamps), racks are not made for such small frames. Getting a rack to fit a small adult's frame is difficult, this thing would be a pain. I'm not saying it can't be done, but it won't be easy. You'll need to make some kind of bracket to attach the top of the rack to the frame.

Any reason you don't want an Extrawheel? I assume because of the cost. It is much more expensive than $84.

Well the one thing about that thing is that it is probably a little heavy. Positive is no worries brazing on it, but there is the weight negative. There was a trailer I once found a website for. It was a company like Topeak, that I didn't primarily associate with trailers. They had a trailer that consisted of a horizontal bar leading to a wheel that was designed to carry like 3 or 4 pairs of panniers. I haven't had much luck finding it when I went back for a look. Anyone know the one I mean?

I have often thought of giving this a go. If i find a second hand one cheap enough I will be attempting it. Maybe check the weight of it or drop in the local bike store and check weight and if it trails vertical when being towed, by that I mean doesn't lean to one side. I saw one being used with a child on and it had a fair lean to one side.

At least once a week one of these bike trailers shows up on craigslist in my area in the $40-60 range.

As far as fitting a rack it seems like P-clamps and a tubing bender will allow that to be possible.

But for that price I wouldn't hesitate to just get some bent 3/8" rod welded onto the frame to allow panniers to easily be attached.

a couple big panniers, on racks , will haul a goodly amount of stuff..
function like an Xtrawheel .. sort of ..

The only thing that would put me off is the weight (as mentioned above). If I were to have a go at something like that (which by my nature, I would), I'd think of putting a suspension mountainbike rack on the back - the kind that attaches to the seatpost. My main concerns would be the material of the tagalong. I'd always go for steel as its fixable (I don;t know, but maybe it is steel anyway), but I imagine with something like that, you'd be looking at straight gauge, heavyweight stuff. If I were to do it, I'd look also at swapping the wheel out for something lighter and better quality, and changing the tyre for a slick.
It's doable, and it would be an interesting project, but I'm not sure the results would compare favourably to a dedicated trailer.

If you found a used kid trailer for a cheap price, I'd say go for it. But Nashbar is offering their BoB trailer knockoff for $119 right now, which is really cheap for a purpose-built cargo trailer.

http://www.nashbar.com/bikes/Product...2_171082_-1___

I like the Xtrawheel idea, too. And the BoB trailer is great. BikeTrailerShop offerers a Greenspeed rack and adapter so you can mount a rack and panniers on the rear of the BoB trailer. I think you could carry your entire life on a LHT with front and rear panniers, and a BoB trailer with additional panniers!

I did this. Just be careful to support the seatpost when lifting the bike after its been laid down. I didn't do this and the weight of the trailer/gear, acting on the seatpost, twisted my frame so much it cracked at the headtube/toptube junction after only 1500 miles.