New Trailer - Sort Of...

[BrokenolMarine]

We had sold the stock trailer we bought a couple years ago, as we never used it, and the neighbor had one we could use if we needed it. But, the floor in his trailer needs replaced. We have offered several times to pay half to have that floor done. He agrees it needs replaced, and he uses it all the time, but... just never gets around to it. When Miss Tina mentioned she was looking for a small stock trailer, the daughter said she had THREE trailers on her property at the Texas border and said to come down and pick up the small two horse one, get it out of her way.

When we got down to pick it up, she said, "Oh, by the way, there is an issue with the brakes, so turn your trailer brakes down to minimum."
We don't have a system controller in the truck, the brakes are applied or not. I was not a happy camper. We drove three hours down to pick up the trailer and it wasn't ready to go.

But, I sent the wife and daughter to Auto Zone to pick up magnetic lights that plug into the trailer light hookup. Good to go.
Once we got home, we took the trailer to the place we bought the dovetail utility trailer and told him to look at the brakes, replace the OLD Crappy tongue jack, and add UPPER doors to the rear so calves and cows couldn't jump out and get hurt.

Looked good when we picked it up from the shop. All fixed.

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A closer look at the trailer:

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The new upper doors

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Last weekend we went to Home Depot and bought a sheet of plexiglass, and replaced the front windows on the trailer. If you look at the pics above, you'll see the hazy green window in the pic. The one on the other side has a softball size hole in the center plus cracks radiating away from the hole and missing pieces. The one you see in the pic actually has a quarter size hole in it and fine cracks spreading.

Drilled out the rivets, drove out the hazy green glass and cut new panels. Looks good now. Didn't want tinted glass in the trailer, want to see the cows or donkey when we haul them.

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Still need to replace some boards in the interior walls, and grind off some flaking paint, some rust, and paint the trailer. If and when it goes back to the daughter, it will be in MUCH better shape than when we got it.

[Mike_S]

Gotta love Mighty Mouse!!

[Handloader]

Nice heavy duty rig.

[BrokenolMarine]

We rarely use it, we just have a few large animals on the small hobby farm. But you can't rent horse/stock trailers around here, and if you need one, you NEED one. Doesn't matter if you need to take a horse or a cow to the vet, or haul something to a show or the market. You can't just put them in a u-haul.

[markiver54]

Nice stout looking trailer.

[Hatchdog]

This area got a good lesson in if you need one you need one with the wildfires this summer. Many had large animals but no way to move them to safety. Thankfully a fleet of trailer owners not affected by the fires teamed up and got all the animals to safety.

[BrokenolMarine]

We had to take a cow to the vet, and were just lucky to have a neighbor who was home, had a trailer and wasn't using it. But... you can't always depend on that. Plus, Tina is a stickler for keeping things neat, clean, and in good working order, as am I. She is not happy to see sagging floors, messes left six inches deep all thru the trailer.... (You know what cows and horses do in them..) So we got the dang thing and invested in fixing it up. We have used it once, but it's here if we need it.