Well I moved the spring mounts 3/4" away from the center, and I personally think the angle of the shackles looks better now, what do you guys think?



Also did a few sections of weld on each corner to get things a little more permanent, and to make sure the welder is working ok.




Did this in each corner, and it's still very square corner to corner!

Good work. What is the small block for?

An excellent question. I bought it for like $125 bucks, complete engine, two q-jets etc. Hoped to put it into a 81-87 Chevy 4x4 truck, but I think now I may go with a 5.3 or 6.0 so this one might be built for something a little more fun than a daily driver, but not sure yet. It's a 4-bolt main block, has been bored .030 over already, but i figure not harm in taking it to 0.040 if needed.

Test fit the axles and springs while things are still tacked. Obviously will be spring-under setup, but just set them on to make sure everything lined up...and it did!

Next step is last 3 cross members, full weld of frame (at least what I can do while it's upside down) and then tongue!

I have about 54" from the front of the deck to the ball and that is more than enough.

Ok, good to know. I was thinking it should be over 4 feet, so low-mid 50's made sense to me I guess.

I've been giving some real serious thought about getting a slightly bigger MIG welder.  I currently have a Lincoln SP-175, and have been thinking about jumping to a 210 amp machine of some sort. Just for times when I would do a small bit of 1/4".

The ESAB welders seem to be impressing a lot of people. The ESAB Rebel EM215ic (MIG and flux only) looks really good for the money (The EMP215ic is the multi-process version), and their sMIG (smart MIG) feature seems to be quite impressive as well from people I've talked to. Normally I wouldn't stray too far from Miller for Lincoln, but ESAB has a good reputation, and local dealer is only 20 mins away!

I've slowly but surely been making some progress. Got the front end of the frame tacked, and got some more cross members cut and tacked in place as well.



Also, was checking square each time I tacked one in place, this looks good enough for this fella!

Rear left corner, to front right:


Rear right corner, to front left:

I picked up a welder extension cord today so that I could continue my work and get things tacked up and in place.

I started first on one of the back corners. I check for level side-to-side, front-to-back, and up-and-down, and also squared the corners. Everything is looking pretty good so far.



I then cut a couple cross members and got those tacked into place as well. All the while checking that the main frame was staying level and square, as well as the cross members themselves.



Btw...anyone ever tack up a crossmember, and then afterwords remember that you start by building the trailer upside down? Yeah...me neither...

Fit looks good.  I would just suggest you hit the welded areas with a grinder to clean up to raw metal before welding.  Wouldn't hurt to add a bit of a chamfer to the thick part of the flange also to get full penetration on your welds.

Yessir that's the plan. I have some flap wheels I got to try out for cleaning off surface rust etc.

So Bear, just as an example, you're describing something like in this picture with the coped joint correct?

Any coping would be with cut off wheels. I have a 4" grinder and a 5" grinder and a chop saw.

I cut the 4 pieces of 5" channel that make the perimeter of the frame. I was originally going to put the sides with the flat side out, and butt them against the front and end pieces which would have the flange out. I'm wondering now if I should  miter them all at 45 deg and have the flat side out all the way around. Any thoughts from the welders here?

I guess it's really more of a T-joint I'm planning on. Cut the front and the rear piece 3/8" too wide to that there'd be 3/16" on each side for a little more meat to weld into. Thought this might be better versus a corner joint there it would be flush.

I've used the last 3 versions of the Rasp. Pi, and tried several little projects. The options really open up now that the RAM is a little higher, back when it was 256 MB, some software struggled. I have a camera module for mine, which I used to experiment with OpenCV (Open Computer Vision). I ran a program that was trained to recognize a human face, and also one that would recognize license plates, so that was pretty neat.

Another project I tried was hosting a mapping/tile server on it. Basically you can setup a tile server from Open Street Maps, and host your very own Google-like maps. Lots of free border data etc for the whole globe, and customizable as well. I had originally done this project for plotting GPS coordinates of a civic address when we get paged to go on a Fire/Rescue calls, so that I can see exactly where I'm going before I hit the road. The main benefit was that since all the data and server was on the Rasp. Pi, I didn't require any internet connection to render/view the maps, or zoom in/out, pan, move around etc etc, and it was very fast.

There's also a gazillion different sensors you can get for these things from motion sensors, to photocells, to gas detectors, to humidity sensors, GPS, you name it. In this context they can basically act as a poor mans PLC, and automate all sorts of tasks based on sensor input.

Perfect, thanks for the info Dawg, those are exactly the uses I had in mind for mine as well!

And just in case someone didn't know, there's a Mil/LE/First Resp. price list with leatherman Pro that applies to LED Lenser as well. Cheers!

I don't disagree with the sentiment, just just to keep things on the up-and-up, using those numbers your percent is a little off:

To figure percent:

33,000 / 324,059,091 = x / 100
33,000 / 324,059,091 * 100 = x
0.0092575708669133% = x

Just sayin! Still not significant of course.

My favorite for all around wear, but admittedly, I mostly used them flying and over in the Stan were the Oakley boots. Love them, absolutely love them.

Hey Don, any Oakley boot specifically? Been looking for a new pair, sorta general purpose I guess, responding to call, wearing camping, maybe a bit of hiking. Was checking out the OakleyForces.ca website, some nice stuff for good prices.

I'm a little late to the game in the this thread, but today I got my very first bow! It's a nice PSE Mustang recurve bow. Tried several at the range at Cabelas, always wanted to try archery and it was a hoot! Tried some compounds too, which are very fun also, but something about the simplicity and challenge of the the recurve I've always liked. I won't be hunting with it, at least not in the near future, just wanted to get it mostly for fun. Hope to set up an 8 yard range in my garage for some winter fun.

Nothing lately, still debating if I should go to .040 over. I think I might be able to keep the crank and maybe the rods. Not sure what to do for heads/intake  though. Thought about maybe putting it in a jeep. Butttt, then as always I got thinking....and I figured I could get a 5.3 pretty cheap, so maybe just go with one of those? What is everyones thoughts?

I will definitely be going with a wooden plank deck (no open center section), and had originally figured on a 5" channel frame and tongue with 3" channel cross members that span the full width of the trailer, spaced at 16" front to back. The biggest vehicles I could see me hauling in the near future would be some atvs, or a car or a small 4x4 like a TJ or a small toyota truck.

What do you mean 4 pieces front to back? Like four 20 foot long pieces of 4" channel? Or just 4" around the perimeter? If I used 4" channel for the main rails, the 2x8" planks won't slide between the top of the cross member and the lip of the main rail, which isn't needed, but is nice to help hold them. Would you have a drawing maybe you could share?

For a 10,000 lb trailer I think you could get by with a 5" channel frame and 3" channel cross-members. 

Yes 5" channel rails and tongue with 3" channel cross members was what I was thinking I'd use. I likely won't ever go bigger than a 10K trailer since my Sierra can't haul bigger than that anyway.

Well, I traded in the Tacoma for a little more towing capacity, and a little more back seat room. With my little girl in her car seat, and at least one adult in the back seat on long trips, it sure is a better size!


2016 Sierra SLE w/Kodiak pkg and a few extra options on top of that :) And the crazy part is, gas mileage isn't much different than the Tacoma, especially when towing!

Hi everyone, I've been collecting parts for my trailer build. I got two 3500lb axles yesterday, I have a 7000lb drop leg jack, and a trailer light kit. Will be getting the springs today likely.

Was just looking for some opinions on the build, if anyone has done something similar. I've build a 5x8 trailer out of angle, and a 5x10 out of square tube, so I'm excited for the project. I think the channel is the way to go, since up here in Canada it's easier to treat rust if it's not on the inside of a square tube.

I plan to use this to be able to haul a car, but also general purpose use like lumber, atv's etc.

Was also wondering about paint, thought about trying to 2-part epoxy paint (KlassKote).

Any helpful hints would be great!

Got the back seat removed and lifted up the vinyl and sound deadening material. It was a little wet under there, likely due to the fact that the rear window latch is broken, and someone try to keep the windows shut with tape (which split). Not too many spots where it's right through, but a good bit of surface rust on the driver floor pan, and the driver rocker needs fixing too. I'm glad I decided to do this now, since as wet as it was it would have rust right through eventually.



Also that sort of greenish gray stuff that they stick on (not sure what it's called) is trapping some moisture as well, so I will scrape/pry that up. Pretty much get it all down to good metal again, unless it's got no rust at all of course. I may even take some pics to a body shop and see what it would cost to have them weld some new metal in. As much as I like to do it myself, bodywork is not my forte, and I would like it done right so I can avoid it again in the near future.

Luckily all the seat bolts came out easily, as did the seats, so as long as the floor/rockers can be fixed everything should be easy to get back together.

Got a new compressor today, in fact the first compressor I've ever owned! Should certainly help with this, and future builds.



It's made in Canada, much like myself. It's a single stage, 60 gallon with 3 cylinder pump. Will do 20 CFM @90PSI. Gonna get a quick connect to put on the compressor as well, but had just screwed the hose in for now to test it out. It's really much more quiet than I thought it would be, you can talk standing within arms reach of it. My brother has a 2 cyl. Campbell Hausfield that is much louder. Anyway, hope it lasts me for many years, sure will be a welcome addition!

Hurray, look what showed up today!