1991 - Volume #15, Issue #1, Page #08
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Livestock Trailer Lowers To The Ground
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The 20-ft. long, 6-ft.wide trailer lowers flush with the ground to load animals, then raises backup for highway transport. A 10-in. stroke hydraulic cylinder mounts on each side of the trailer. The cylinders, powered by a hydraulic pump driven by a 12-volt battery, push down on the frame which is free to slide up and down inside a "box socket". Wilson notes that the same hydraulic elevating trailer bed principle was used on old cotton trailers.
"I built it because I keep cattle in a pasture several miles from where I live, and I was always hauling dry and fresh cows back and forth with a conventional trailer," says Wiles. "Cows don't like to step up a steep ramp, and fresh cows with full udders sometimes injured themselves.
' Cows feel much more comfortable walking into the trailer at ground level. One timeI was carrying acalf to the trailer and her mother walked right into the trailer before I got the calf there.
"My hydraulic trailer lets me load cattle without a chute. I back the truck and trailer at an angle to the fence near a corner and use the fence and trailer as a chute to funnel cattle in. After loading I raise the floor back up and flip a `stop' over the cylinders to lock the trailer in position."
The tongue, which Wiles built from 6 by 8-in. box tubing, extends 8 ft. back underneath the trailer. To make room for the tongue when the trailer is lowered Wiles built a 6-in. "step" into the floor. "The step allows the rear 8 ft. of the floor to drop all the way to the ground," ex-plains Wiles. "I can set up a 6-ft. wide divider gate inside the trailer to keep weak cows from walking up the step."
Wiles used salvaged mobile home tandem axles equipped with 14.5 by 14 tires and 12-ft. lengths of channel iron to build the trailer's frame. The sides are made from aluminum. The floor was built with pressure-treated wood. The front end of the tongue is equipped with a pintle hitch. "The hitch is probably heavier than necessary, but I wanted it strong because of the stress caused by twisting, raising and lowering of the floor," says Wiles. "The only problem I had is when manure got between the steel frame and aluminum sides which caused aluminum to oxidize. I added wood blocks between steel and aluminum to solve the problem."
Wiles spent $4,500 to build the trailer which holds seven mature cows.
Contact: FARM SHOW Followup, Charles Wiles, Rt. 1, Box 223, Williamsport, Md. 21795 (ph 301-582-2277 or 301-582-1007).
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