WHY BUILD AN OFF-ROAD TRAILER

UNFULFILLED

After three winters of traveling around the U.S. southwest on countless off-road trails, it became apparent that simple day trips just weren’t going to cut it anymore.  If we really wanted to experience all that nature and our Land Rover Defender 90 could offer, it was obvious that trails needing more than a single day to complete, had to be tackled.  These past day trips also taught us that in order to do photographic justice to the incredible landscapes we were seeing, more time was needed to evaluate the subtle differences a particular location could display from one moment to the next.

FINDING THE RIGHT WAY

So now came the task of determining how we were going to accomplish these multi-day journeys. They would obviously require some form of camping in the wilderness.  But what kind of camping... how basic were we willing to go?  To answer this, we had to acknowledge one universal fact of life. As one gets older, their tolerance for "basic" diminishes on a logarithmic scale.  When someone's body is made from an assemblage of broken parts left over from years of use, misuse, and questionable maintenance, the idea of lying on the ground with only a thin piece of Ensolite between their backside and the cold hard earth is something that can only be attempted after downing a bottle of one’s favourite “medicinal” beverage. And certainly in that case, the closer you are to the ground, the better... less distance to fall.

If we were going to spend time off the beaten path, we needed to be as comfortable as possible, and this meant taking as many of the amenities with us as possible.  A good bed, decent facilities for meal preparation and storage, and some sort of personal cleansing system. And for the latter, we certainly wanted something more than just a cooking pot with fresh water in it, heated by a Coleman stove.

OUR BEST SOLUTION

Since the Defender was a multi-function vehicle, the idea of setting it up as a full time camper wouldn't work. So the only solution was to tow a camp trailer when needed. But what kind? The mass produced camp trailers that are sold to the general public for use at the RV Park or state/provincial campground, would be of little use. They're far too wide and low slung to make it over the narrow, difficult four wheel drive trails we travel when looking for those incredible landscapes. Moreover, they're heavy, and as anyone whose spent much time off-road knows, weight is the enemy.

We considered the commercially available off-road trailers, but none that we looked at really suited our needs. It was still early days in North America for these sort of trailers. For us, the best thing to do was to simply build a trailer of our own design.

CONSTRAINTS

Right from the start, we were faced with constraints that the average off-roader wouldn't have to worry about... the physical size of the trailer. In our case, this off-road trailer was going to have to fit inside a stacker highway trailer that was pulled behind our motorhome. But not by itself. It had to fit inside along with the Defender. The problem was that the highway trailer had an inside length of only twenty feet. The length of the Defender was a little under fifteen feet, which left only five feet for the off-road trailer, including the tongue. Not much of a trailer to be sure.

Fortunately, the idea of building an off-road trailer had been considered long before the highway trailer was built. And we determined at that time that the solution to the length issue was a vertical one. Although the five or so feet of remaining length inside the highway trailer was useless for an off-road trailer, it was perfect for a vertical lift platform. By having a stacker trailer built with an inside height of ten feet, and a vertical lift platform in the front of it, we could now build an off-road trailer with a very usable overall length of ten feet. By pushing the off-road trailer into the highway trailer before the Defender, and onto the lift, it could then be raised enough to drive the Defender in underneath. Length problem solved.

Other dimensional issues still had to be worked out, but the main one, that of length, was behind us. Well, sort of. At this point there was still no clear design of the trailer as a whole, and as with so many things, we needed to start at the ground and work up from there. So the first thing that we had to make a decision about was the chassis. Do we create one of our own from scratch, which would take a lot of engineering work, or do we try and find one already built? Knowing from past experience just how difficult it can be to properly engineer and build something like a trailer chassis, our first choice was to see if we could find a good pre-built one.

When we were researching the various trailers at the start of all of this, we had looked at the product line offered by a company called Adventure Trailer, located in Prescott, Arizona. Although we weren't real keen on the body style of their trailers, being essentially one of the box types, we were very impressed with their chassis design. The air sprung, independent suspension design that they had developed was clearly many levels above anything else on the market at that time, domestic or import. And of the three trailers that they offered, the dimensions of their Horizon model were very close to what we needed for our solution. But would they sell us just the chassis, and if so, would they charge an outlandish price for it? The only way to know for sure was to pay them a visit and talk to Mario and Martyn, the two principles of the company.

FAST TRACKING THE BUILD

We paid a visit to Adventure Trailer and after several hours of measuring, fiddling with a calculator and double checking everything, we determined that their Horizon model chassis would indeed work for our project. Only a slight modification to the length of the trailer tongue would be needed to shorten it for the overall length restriction that we had.

We knew it would work, but would Adventure Trailer agree to sell a chassis by itself. We have to admit, they were hesitant at first, fearful that something with their name attached to it would end up part of someone else's bastardized contraption.  But after highlighting our background, describing what we were going to build, and showing them examples of our work, they agreed to quoting us a price. So we left with the anticipation of a forthcoming price quotation, but worried that it might be more than we were willing to pay.

As it turned out, we were pleasantly surprised when the chassis price we received was only $800 more than the collective price we had obtained for the materials, parts and paint we would use to build it ourselves.  So what we were actually paying extra for was the labour component needed to build the chassis.  All their engineering and testing, we got for free. A real bargain, in our opinion.

The Sum Of The Parts

From Start To Finish… A 2500 Kilometre Journey

From its summertime start in a West Vancouver garage, to the final completion in springtime Arizona, the build of our off-road trailer spanned eight months and 2500 kilometres. Annual timing was such that if we wanted to escape the gloom of the west coast Canadian winter, but continue to work on the trailer during those months, we would need a place to do so in the south. That place was the garage of good friends who live in Fountain Hills, Arizona. They shuffled their vehicles and gear about to create enough room for us to keep the trailer inside for the entire time, and allowed us to work there all day when nobody was home. Their trust and generosity will always be a cherished memory for us.

After two consecutive seasons full of trailer design and early stage metal fabrication, we had succeeded in getting the trailer to the stage where the body construction was essentially complete and mounted on the Horizon trailer frame. But winter was upon us and that made working in a small, unheated garage much less attractive, and certainly less productive. The trailer chassis with the body bolted onto it pretty much filled the garage, so we had almost no room to work on the dozens of smaller parts needed to finish the inside of the trailer, not to mention all the doors needed to close it in. So in early January, 2012, we loaded everything up, including our TIG welding machine, and headed south to the northeast corner of the Phoenix valley.

By the end of April, the trailer was finished and ready for service. All we had to do was make a trip with it over to Prescott, AZ, to get the final wheel alignment done at Adventure Trailers. We think the guys there were a bit overwhelmed with what they saw, as we're pretty sure they didn't really believe us about what we were going to build. In any event, a photo they took of the trailer was on their Facebook page within a half hour of our visit. And now we see that they are selling the chassis of their various trailers for the DIY people out there. So good on them for standardizing an idea that we brought to them. We're delighted that we could be their first chassis customer.

It's all in the details

From the smallest door clasp, to a slide out generator, the finished trailer is a fine example of efficient space utilization and system redundancy. It provides all the desired amenities for a longer off-road journey including hot and cold running water, cold food storage, gas hob cooking and a comfortable place to sleep in the clamshell style rooftop tent from Autohome.

Right Side of The Trailer

The right side of the trailer was set up as the food preparation and cooking area. It provides easy access to the fridge/freezer, sink, gas cooktop, coffee maker and even a small microwave oven. The cooktop and an on-demand hot water heater are fed from an onboard 17 pound non-metallic propane tank, and there is 12 volt and 110 volt power, the later of which is provided by a 2000 watt marine grade inverter/charger, shore power or 2000 watt Honda generator.

Left Side of The Trailer

The left side of the trailer provides a small bathroom organizer section with hot and cold running water, a small sink, towel and toiletries storage. It also houses the generator compartment with a slide out low noise generator.

Back Side of The Trailer

The back of the trailer provides food storage compartments and a fold down work area with a full dimension white plastic cutting board. Underneath of that is the full length pull out equipment storage drawer that can be used for storing the shower/toilet enclosure, PETT toilet and other gear.

Front Left Corner of The Trailer

The front left angled face of the trailer is the utilities compartment. It's the technical area where the propane bottle is housed, the water pump and water inlet is connected, and most importantly, it's where the control panel is for the battery charger and 110 volt inverter is located. Shore power enters the trailer in this compartment, and the propane fired hot water heater is also located here. The on demand hot water heater is mounted on the door so it can swing out clear of any overhead obstructions when in use. The exhaust coming out of the top of it is very hot.

Front Right Corner of The Trailer

The front right angled face of the trailer is the "wardrobe" compartment where clothing can be hung up on a rail, or simply stored in duffle or other bags.

Other Storage Spots

Another spot on the trailer that we've used for storage is the area inside the plinth that supports the roof top tent. It was perfect for holding our two camp chairs and the folding table. On the outside of the plinth, on either side, is where the two ARB awnings are kept tightly secured.

Above Lake Powell in Arizona

The early loss of daylight wasn't a problem for us.