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I need to move a trailer like this one here but with 4 wheels (two on both sides). I have no access to cars. The distance is about 100km or more, and I am a bit unsure how I am going to move it:

  1. where I should move it on pedestrian way or on car road?
  2. How should I do it?
  3. I am ready to buy any bike to move this type of things so some recommendations for this type of cargo moving with bike? Diamond-framed may not be the best option. I have some friends on the journey so I have considered to hack a dandem or tri-bicycle or weld old touring bikes together to form one larger X-cycle.
  4. I have noticed that my bicycle brakes are not really enough to move larger cargos, any ideas how to upgrade brakes in bike or some hack to the trailer? Or how many bicycles would be enough to stop this at least 1.3Mg beast?
  5. I think we are going to move during night anyway but we may need to use some car roads - what kind precautions should I do with the trailer besides installing a lot of blinking lights and reflectors?
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@hhh - "I am ready to buy any bike" - Dude! You're usually frugal! – user313 Jun 22 '11 at 23:01
bad idea, I recommed getting a car to do this, if it were only 1Km I think it would be fine but in this case it's mad and probably illegal. Also, what's 1.3Mg? Do you mean 1.3 tons? – jackJoe Jun 23 '11 at 9:20
1Mg = 1 megagram = 1000 kilograms, aka one tonne (metric ton). "Metric ton" is more commonly used in the US but Mg is the official SI unit. – lantius Jun 23 '11 at 19:17
@jackjoe: also, ton and tonnes are regularly confused. One is the imperial unit (whichever of those you prefer), the other is metric. But I can't remember which is which, or indeed which of the imperial units is most common. So better to use SI, at least it's unambiguous. – Мסž Jun 24 '11 at 0:54
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@hhh: I'd love to know why you want to move the trailer without a motor vehicle, and what you're going to do with it when you get it, if you don't have a motor vehicle to tow it with. – Мסž Jun 24 '11 at 0:55
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3 Answers

up vote 6 down vote accepted

The first question is what the legal situation is. I am fairly sure that in Australia that trailer would not be a legal bike trailer because of the overhang past the rear axle, but the police would stop you because it's too large (they generally don't know this part of the law very well). Either way, I doubt you'd get far before they took an interest.

If you can tow it legally, I'd look at how to activate the brakes in the trailer. You will need to be able to do that relatively easily, because those will be your only effective brakes. That trailer will push a bicycle with it's wheels locked up quite easily. So, make the trailer brakes work.

Then I would build a quick semitrailer-style load tricycle, either a tandem or triplet. Somewhere on the net are photos of a bike shop move (in north america?) where they built a couple of semi-trailer style trike+trailer units for the heavy stuff (workbenches at 200kg+). Broadly, a solid axle between two wheelbarrow-style wheels, one side driven, very low geared, upright trike. You would probably want gears in there, but the main thing is to mount the towball as close to that axle as you can. Have the rear rider operate the (trailer) brakes, and the front rider operate the steering and gears. I would fit brakes to the trike but only for legal reasons and so it can be ridden separately from the trailer.

Depending on the weight of the trailer and the slope of the hills, you may find that you need a few extra riders to help push the trailer up hills. Either way, walking speed is a fair guess at how fast you'll go. Partly because you don't want to go faster than that down hills either.

You will probably have better luck if you do it as a charity ride - it doesn't really matter which charity, just pick one you kind like who will let you use their name and start advertising "fund raising ride - five idiots pull a big trailer from Here to There using a tricycle". With a little effort I'm sure you could even make enough money for them to be really happy :)

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up vote 4 down vote

Put an advert up with your local paper/Craigslist and offer the free use of the trailer on the proviso that they collect it for you. There are always people wanting to move house etc. and they may be glad of the favour.

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That's not a bad idea! It seems unlikely, but it's certainly possible and it costs nothing to find out. – Neil Fein Jun 23 '11 at 3:35
up vote 1 down vote

Moving this with bicycles sounds horribly unsafe. I recommend against it, and here's why:

Tandems often use drum brakes, particularly on the rear wheels, but if the trailer you're moving is as heavy as most auto/truck trailers, you're going to have a difficult time stopping it from moving, particularly when going downhill, even with a drum brake system built for bicycles. You'd need to find a way to trigger the trailer's brakes from the bikes, possibly to work simultaneously.

From the picture, it looks like this trailer is as wide as an automobile, perhaps wider. I don't think you'd be able to fit that on a sidewalk/pavement in any case, local regulations aside. (Most locales encourage bicycles from riding on the sidewalk/pavement, and sometimes prohibit it entirely. It's difficult to say more without knowing what locations you'll be passing through.)

Keep in mind that if you lose control of the trailer, not only could the trailer be damaged, but the cyclist(s) could be injured, and another driver or a bystander could easily be hurt or killed.

It it's vital to have the trailer moved, I would seriously consider having it moved on a flatbed truck rather than tow it with bicycles.

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Neil, the trailer will have brakes of its own. Probably simple inertia brakes, but they might be heavy vehicle style air brakes. Either way, it wouldn't be legal without them. – Мסž Jun 22 '11 at 23:23
@moz - I didn't know that. Then, hhh would have to find a way to trigger those brakes while on the bikes. I have an image in my head of a team of cyclists set up like dogs in a harness, probably two abreast. Keeping the cyclists in sync would be a nightmare. – Neil Fein Jun 23 '11 at 3:31
Have edited my answer, although I would love to be proven wrong about this! – Neil Fein Jun 23 '11 at 3:34
@Neil: yes. Doing it that way would be illegal everywhere I know of (cyclists are not allowed to tow other vehicles, or be towed by them), as well as complex to set up - animal powered wagons use load balancing beams between the two rows, and often gravity-based shock absorbers. Doing that with cyclists would be hard. Better to use a tandem/triplet/N-let (paced races on velodromes used to use 8 or more riders on one bike before motors became more widely available) – Мסž Jun 23 '11 at 3:36
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@NeilFein let us continue this discussion in chat – Мסž Jun 23 '11 at 3:42
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