Originally Posted by
crash
Goose neck trailers ride better, for sure. The draw backs are that the bed of the truck is largely used up, and interference with the truck cab is sometimes an issue.
I personally have 9 trailers. 3 of them are goose neck.
My current race car trailer that I take to the track all the time is a tag. Sway can be an issue so I have two sway arrestors on the hitch. It is rated for 15,000 lbs. I need a class A after 10,000 lbs in CA and have one. If I was buying new I would have likely gone for a less than 30' goose neck, but I got a deal on this at $4500 and it has a $10,000 awning on it. I kid you not. I went to Larson Sails to get a quote on just replacing the canvas on this awning and it was $7,000. The trailer is a Carson and I have to tell you, it needed quite a bit of work. Seems to me like they took their standard 10,000 lbs trailer and just put another axle on it and called it a 15,000 lbs rated trailer. At least that is what the purchase receipt from the previous buyer states. I have reinforced the frame significantly as the beaver tail was sagging and there was no support under where the actual race car tires were sitting which had led to the plywood warping and drooping over time. Basement was a joke, and I welded in wall supports for full length E Track on the walls. Again, just the fact that it came with an 18' X 28' awning made the effort worth while.
The tag trailer works well enough, but I would recommend a goose neck if you are not worried about price. If you are worried about price, then a used tag might make a lot of sense if the right deal comes around like in my case.
I think you can go a max of 108" wide? That makes a difference and I would go the max trailer width with any full size desert vehicle being towed. Also nice to have the rails on the sides so you don't load off the side when it is near impossible to see where you are on the trailer when loading a high vehicle like a desert truck. Drive over fenders are pretty much standard when you are trying to tow a large truck, but the higher deck trailers can be cheaper to find since they are a more equipment type of a trailer. I have a 40' flat deck equipment trailer and it was a relatively cheap 26,500 lbs rated trailer. Goose neck. The problem with it is that when it comes time to replace the tires, which I just did, it is 8 tires which costs a couple thousand bucks. On the other hand, it allowed me to just buy a 20,000 lbs piece of equipment at auction and move it around. I wasn't planning on owning something this large but was glad I had the extra capacity when the need arose. I would definitely recommend going larger than you think you need.
A non commercial Class A was not that hard to get in CA and well worth not having to worry about being pulled over for weight/incorrect license issues. In CA that is a game stopper and the vehicle will not be allowed to move until a properly licensed person shows up to move it. If you cannot arrange this quickly, the rig will be towed and storage and towing WAY surpass the costs of a Class A.
IIRC my big trailer is made by Brute, but I don't think you can go wrong with Texas Pride. You might want to look at some of the "Dirt Monkey" YouTube videos as he goes to the trailer shows every year and gets into them pretty deep. Crawling under, on top, visiting manufacturing facilities, etc.
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