In reply to novaderrik:
No one is doubting the truck can handle it, but loading something low will be a pain due to the height. One solution is to get a second race car. Then you will have a trailer and you can have a set of ramps up to the trailer then a second set from the trailer to the truck.
accordionfolder wrote: OR A DUMPER! http://sfbay.craigslist.org/nby/cto/4428720378.html Ha!
DING! DING! DING!
We have a winner here!!
Here what I did at around 21.
https://www.facebook.com/media/set/?set=a.519534174819681.1073741835.100002893081629&type=1&l=97f2c68d27
dean1484 wrote: My only comment is that I would tend to look at Dodge trucks. All the Dodge Trucks I have had were under rated in terms of load and towing capacity's.
Sorry, this was the funniest damn thing I've read on here this week.
Back to on topic, you can build one of those beds with a welder, some small box tubing, and some diamond plate.....it'll look better if you're decent at welding and take your time. I can tell you that you absolutely don't want to use the standard deck height of those. My 63's deck height is roughly 4ft off the ground at the back. 
In reply to yamaha:
Yeah, that's kind of my point, it takes some long ramps to get most race cars on to a dove tail trailer, I'm imagining 72' long ramps to get up to a 4' tall deck.
In reply to yamaha:
I wish I had pictures of my Grandpa hauling tractors with a heavy gauge flatbed trailer on the bumper of the 1990 D150 I now own. Everyone in the family always brings up how fast it went through transmissions, it's on its 4th and I'm about to have to replace it. It's getting upgraded components this time though.
In reply to moparman76_69:
This will be the first year we haven't pulled our 1600gal liquid trailer with the '87 F150, so yea.....we're used to overloading the berkeley out of things(Go figure we haven't managed to kill its C6 trans yet)
You'd probably really like our new equipment trailer though, Suretrac 22' power tilt, it has I beams for the frame.
44Dwarf wrote: Here what I did at around 21. https://www.facebook.com/media/set/?set=a.519534174819681.1073741835.100002893081629&type=1&l=97f2c68d27
that is my vision, as well... black out the windows so no one sees what's inside and have a rolling garage..
AFAIK no one was hurt, but this happened here recently. I'm told some of the blame lies with the CHP though, apparently they were hassling the tow truck driver to get it cleared quickly and reopen the road.
I work around a fair number of tow guys and it seems like most of them will admit to 'losing' a car at some point if they're comfortable. I regularly estimate to repair damage done by transporters, and occasionally at work i actually see transporters damaging cars (i dont stand out there all the time or i would probably see it all the time). Honestly, they mess up cars frequently and actually drop/lose them on occasion.
Even among the people who do it for a living, the way they secure or carry vehicles often seems kinda half-ass. Usually the stuff on back of rollbacks is pretty safe as long as they arent tearing a gash in the underbody or bending or breaking whatever they hook to, but at least it's on tight! The wheel lifts and the ramp trailers seem much less safe...
Vigo wrote: I work around a fair number of tow guys and it seems like most of them will admit to 'losing' a car at some point if they're comfortable.
Yup. My neighbor owned a tow company growing up, and in conversation he brought up personally, and having employees, "lose" some cars over the years.
Not exactly something that gets advertised 
accordionfolder wrote: In reply to irish44j: At every event I've been to, while unloading/loading a race car onto a trailer it is always done with the rear wheels of the truck on ramps.
we should have been fine, but the bolts for the harness through the floor actually got caught up on the back lip and we ripped one out of the floor. Also the car was full of heavy gear, a full set of race tires, etc.
On the way back we added a couple 2x8s and didn't load the car until it was on the trailer already....problem solved. It was the first time putting that car on that trailer, we just forgot about the fact that we hadn't cut the bolts off shorter underneath (also later done).
Point being, though, that the angle of a truck much higher would require much, much longer ramps for a lowish car to clear it (assuming it doesn't have a dovetail, which the original trucks he posted do not). Simple geometry...
I agree with the folks talking about the height. My dad owned a machine shop and he had a 74 GMC flatbed and later an 86 Chev. The GMC was 2wd and the bed was at least 4' off the ground. The Chev was 4wd and was even higher. Even loading mini bikes on the back was a daunting task. Your ramps will be long and will require very good supports.
The other part is that it will be a top heavy pig with 2500-3000 lbs of car with a centre of gravity about 6 or 7 feet above the ground.
So I guess this begs the question: could I potentially lower the truck while maintaining hauling ability? I'm not opposed to a trailer BTW, I probably will end up with one, just exploring all my options.
In reply to accordionfolder:
The problem is the wheel height and bed design
^^This^^
You've got tires that are gonna be 30+ inches tall, and you've got to give them some room to move under suspension compression (or you could STANCE it I guess 
), then build a deck on top of that. I don't think you'll be able to get much lower than the flat beds already are.
On a semi-related note, I've noticed that those low cab forward Isuzu commercial trucks run much smaller rear wheels and therefore can have lower deck heights, has anybody looked into that?
EDIT: Well, they CAN run smaller rear tires, a quick google shows that not all do.
In reply to ShadowSix:
In reply to yamaha:
Ah, didn't think of that side of it. If only I had my garage and welder in SF (it's with my dad...). The hunt continues! I've been searching for a legitimate car hauler, but not much luck so far.
There is a trailer shop near me that for 2800 you can get a new tilt bed car hauler , no ramps!!
I bought a used trailer for 1200 had to buy ramps 150 then discovered it eats tires at 400 a set and wont carry much more than 3000lbs due to rubbing issues. I will never buy a used trailer again. Any one want a trailer, just kidding.. I wont do that to anyone.
accordionfolder wrote: So I guess this begs the question: could I potentially lower the truck while maintaining hauling ability? I'm not opposed to a trailer BTW, I probably will end up with one, just exploring all my options.
You'd have to get very custom to make this a reasonable idea.
Airbag suspension is common, and fairly simple and durable to set up. You could theoretically have the rear suspension air out for unloading to angle the truck back and bring the rear tires all the way up to the bed floor. Additionally you could angle the bed itself into more of a ramp, and dove tail or radius the bed downwards starting at the point over the tires.
All those incremental changes combined will bring the tail of the truck down to a more manageable loading height, but will require a lot of fabrication on your part.
$7500 in Wisconsin will get you this......used to be a fire truck. 
Wonder if the gears in that thing are over or under 5.00. Just food for thought.
In reply to tpwalsh:
That one has at least modern axles under it I think.....the bonus is that it would be old enough to tell the commies over in CA to GFY on emissions.
A guy I went to high school with said his last night as a tow truck driver was when he realized the car passing him backwards on the highway was the one he had hooked up.
I kind of want to build one of these. I've seen two or three renditions by now.
In reply to Vigo:
How does the transmission not die?
yamaha wrote: In reply to Vigo: How does the transmission not die?
A rebuild with the upgraded parts, shift kit and a huge trans cooler have made mine pretty good. I managed to kill 7 C4's in a six-cylinder mustang so I'm hard on transmissions. The trans doesn't have any really bad design flaws, most of the failures come from either wrong fluid, or excess heat. I'd still probably put a trans temp gauge on one of those though.
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