I Want To Buy This Trailer .... Opinions?

i love it. i would like to find a small basic aluminum trailer, with no frills, that i can haul leaf bags to the recycling center with. maybe 5' x 8' or so.

 

You've already pulled a much higher gross weight (the U-Haul) with no problems. The aluminum trailer you propose and the 600 lb. gross weight should be no problem at all (that's even within the Prius GVWR unless you're a "full-figured" person. My trailer is the folding 4 x 8 you see in various ads. It weighs about 250 lbs. and handles my 550 lb. John Deere just fine. I saw "my" trailer on sale at Harbor Freight a couple of weeks ago for $219. (You'd need a piece of plywood and maybe some better lights, and a day or so to assemble it.)

 

in most circumstances. large uphill climbs would probably put some extra strain on the system.

 

the first one, 400 pounds.

 

I find harbor freight to be my answer. Moved son and daughter in and out of college with it. Fullerton to fresno 4000 foot rise 277 miles 700 lb in the car(people included), 900 plus in trailer!!! 55 mph cruise controlled up the grade at Tejón pass I-5 kept two bars and was using 80% load and 4000+ rpm to sustain it. No problem at all on flat and level other than a
Drop in mpg (32)


iPhone ?

 

The folding trailer weighs only 250lb and was $300 I had to put it together and add wood it took a day and stirs on the side of my house under the eve. Never expected to tow 900 lbs on it. Toung weight was 75 lb and with the wind drag at 55 mph it was less than zero.


iPhone ?

 

i don't think so. i've gone back nd forth on this. the thought of an aluminum trailer is alluring, but is it worth the money just for a dump run? i think the harbor freight unit would be fine.

 

Heavy Duty Utility Trailer - 870 Lb. Capacity

 

the reviews of the harbor freight are pretty horrible. if you can do your own wheel bearing grease, tail light re wiring and replacement, etc. i think they are a good value. chinese is as chinese does.

 

A picture I have posted before of my trailer that weighs 2420lbs loaded and towed without problems now for many thousands of miles.


John (Britprius)

 

The trailer has a body length (not including the towing bar) of 16ft 6inches tow bar adds another 3ft 6inches, and is 7ft 6inches wide. The trailer has it's own radio controlled electric drive system for easy parking. Go to about 2minutes 30 seconds in the linked video.
Reich Move Control english Image Video - YouTube

John (Britprius)

 

The Prius is a lot more capable at towing than many believe. I do take sensible precautions like monitoring important temperatures, but find towing within our legal speed limits "50 mph on normal roads 60 mph on motorways" to be perfectly reasonable driving sensibly.
Wind resistance with my particular setup probably plays a bigger part than the weight. The trailer has it's own braking system, and the car stops better with the trailer than it does without.
Fuel consumption with the trailer shows a loss of around 15 mpg usually in the high 40's dropping from the mid 60's bearing in mind our gallons are 10% larger than the US. I put these very good figures down to the extra regen from the weight of the trailer when slowing down, and driving at sensible speeds.
I would imagine the trailer you are anticipating towing will hardly be noticeable on the rear of your car.
Possibly the only difference with my setup compared to the US is the actual tow bracket on the car. My bracket fits in the same way as the US bracket, but also has a center beam going forwards under, and fastened to the spare wheel well to act as a cantilever for the weight on the tow hitch that I load to 130 lbs. It also has an anti snaking device that doubles up assisting with reducing hitch weight.

John (Britprius)