Fabrication Advice or Thoughts; Side Rails for My Trailer

Background:  I have a small open deck trailer that I tow both the Datsun 1200 and F500. I can driver the 1200 onto the trailer but due to the depth of the rails I have to winch the F500 on. I can add boards to the trailer to raise the F500 up BUT then that only leaves about 1" of side railing and I am very concerned that would make it very easy to dump the 1200 off the side or front.  

Solution:  Add some side rails

Issue: I do not weld and my welder fabricator is across town (1.5 hour round trip) and he really doesn't like to do this kind of work. Plus I would like to do this myself

Fabrication Thoughts: 

a. Bolt some angle iron to the side of trailer than bolt angle iron to that, that would give me a 2" lip (the current deck is only 2" deep)

b. Bolt some angle iron to the side of trailer and simply bolt the appropriate thickness wood to that.

c. Bolt some angle iron to the side of trailer, then make a railing out of threaded pipe and bolt that to the angle iron.

Thoughts, advice, insults (yes, father was a hamster) etc. are welcome.  I've included a crappy cropped picture of the trailer so you can get an idea of what it looks like.

Why do you think you need side rails?

IF the vehicle is tied down properly I don't see the need for side rails.

jimbbski said:

Why do you think you need side rails?

IF the vehicle is tied down properly I don't see the need for side rails.

 

I'm paranoid about driving the Datsun off the front or side. As it's a tilt trailer I don't use ramps when loading the Datsun and the ramp angle is really steep. About 18 years ago I almost drove it off the side (under inflated tire grabbed the side rail). I was luckily and only ended up with one wheel hanging off the side, I was at the house so I used the engine hoist to lift the car and it rolled back on. Granted I was in a hurry and it was a bit of a fluke. 

How about shortening the inner rails that are the issue for the F500?  Yes, you will still need for someone to either weld a new cap onto the shortened rails, or just cut them out and weld in square tubing that is half as high as what you have now.  I'm sure that there are *many* welders in the LV area who are closer than your current guy.  Just an idea.  

In reply to JBinMD :

I currently have a set of boards I insert in the rails to raise the F500 up. That system works great when I winch the F500 on the trailer but if I want to drive the the car up it pan scrapes. I only need about 1/4" - 1/2" more clearance. I also want to permanently fix the boards to the deck rather than removing them when I switch cars. 

If it were my trailer I'd weld a 2x 1/4 flat bar all around the inside edge of the outer frame. Your idea of bolting 2x2 angle along that rail amounts to the same thing. Time for you to buy a used MIG welder and learn to melt metal !

Bolting a 2-3" angle iron as you said will be fine. I'm not sure if would actually help during a mishap,  but if it gives you more confidence in loading up, you won't have any mishaps. 

What's holding you from getting a welder and learning?

Any chance of fitting taller transit wheels on the f500?

Barring that, what about big angle iron attached to your spacer boards to give you the lip?

Apexcarver said:

What's holding you from getting a welder and learning?

 

Any chance of fitting taller transit wheels on the f500?

 

Barring that, what about big angle iron attached to your spacer boards to give you the lip?

For what little welding I need it just isn't worth it. I can gas weld but haven't in many years. Most of the welding I need is done on the race cars and usually involves other fabrication so I take it to my guy.  The F500 loads fine as does the Datsun I'm just trying to make it so I don't have to reconfigure things. It's only about 10 minutes worth of work but it's storing the parts for that the bugs me. I hate clutter in the garage.

Ok, so within your caveots andy understanding, here's what I would do. Permanently install boards to raise the vehicle height, which would resolve the f500 ground clearance issue. Add angle iron to sides of board (bolt on) and through lagbolt straight iron sandwich between board and angle iron to give whatever height lip you desire.

Then whenever you are around someone with a welder, have them do several small lengths of weld plate to angle to double shore it up.

Apexcarver said:

What's holding you from getting a welder and learning?

 

Any chance of fitting taller transit wheels on the f500?

 

Barring that, what about big angle iron attached to your spacer boards to give you the lip?

Either that or maybe some spring bushings for the F500 to make it ride higher during transit?  

Just curious why you don't like winching it on??    seems like the best way to do it and it's already set up for that.

In reply to jfryjfry (FS) :

Driving it up saves some time.........simple as that.

The transit wheels for the F500 would be really easy, just cut some plywood circles (make sure they're round).  Could also be used for alignments.