Shop-Built Dump Trailer Perfect For Small Projects

Shop-Built Dump Trailer Perfect For Small Projects Retired farmer Rick Schlosser always wanted a small dump trailer, but the purchase price was too high for how much use it’d get. One day, as he tinkered in his shop, an old John Deere axle from a 1950s equipment transport and unused rock picker’s 3 by 24-in. hydraulic cylinders sparked his imagination to build his own trailer. “I’ve always had some projects in mind that I should deal with, like moving firewood, carrying rocks or completing landscape jobs, so I thought I could put something together to make those kinds of things work,” Schlosser says. He had plenty of metal in storage, so he used it to build the box frame. For the walls, he adapted extensions from an old fertilizer applicator. The wheels and rims came from the old transport axle, and he ordered new 750 by 15-in. dual tires to replace the worn and damaged originals. To complete the floor and hoist, he purchased 2 by 8-in. planks and an electric-over-hydraulic pump to lift the box. A remote control lets him operate the unit from the cab. Schlosser installed a truck or tractor-capable ball-hitch system to make it multi-purpose. “I worried about the mounting points for the hoist to angle and dump properly, so I took some straight edges and chalk, laid everything out on the shop floor, measured it up, and put it together,” he says. “When I tried it, I crossed my fingers that it would work. It operated perfectly.” Schlosser estimates he put about $2,000 and 30 hrs. of work into the finished 7 by 9-ft. dump-trailer box project. Contact: FARM SHOW Followup, Rick Schlosser, Mandan, N.D. 58554 (rschlosserm6@gmail.com).

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