Tips for Maintaining Your Trailer
Your approach to maintaining a trailer should be the same as for any sort of vehicle. If your trailer is roadworthy and in good condition, it will give you longer operating life, be safer for you to use, and won’t present any sort of danger to other road users. So whether you use your trailer for work, like a tradesman trailer or a tipping trailer, or you just have a 6 x 4 single axle box trailer for taking rubbish to the dump or to be recycled, maintenance and upkeep is always important.
As Basic Trailers manufactures trailers in South Australia, we also have a pretty good idea about how to look after them as well. Read our tips and advice below on keeping your Adelaide trailer on the road and in good working order.
Looking after the tow coupling
The first key to safe towing is to ensure that the vehicle and trailer are properly connected, and a well-maintained tow coupling is crucial to this.
You should therefore give the hitch a regular inspection, to ensure that no parts have worked themselves loose. At the same time, check that the tow ball on your vehicle is tight, and that it doesn’t wobble or spin around. It also helps at periodic intervals to apply some grease to the inside of the tow coupling, as this will make it both easier to hitch and unhitch, and will also reduce wear and tear.
Check your electrical cables regularly, as these can quite easily become frayed or damaged if they are not stowed properly, and it is also a good idea to give the electrical plug on your towing vehicle a spray with WD40 occasionally, in order to prevent rusting.
Make sure you’re lighting up properly
As well as checking the connections and electrical cables, it pays to physically check that all of the lights on your trailer are working properly. This means that the brake lights on the trailer come on as soon as the brakes are applied in the towing vehicle, the indicators are in sync, and the hazards lights work as well. You also need to make sure that the number plate light is operational, or that the tail lights illuminate it sufficiently well.
Check your brakes
As you would with any vehicle, it is important that you check regularly that the braking system on your trailer is in good order. This means checking your brake cables for wear and tear, and looking for wear on the bearings and brake shoes. Brake pads are easily and cheaply replaced, so if in any doubt about these, it is always worthwhile making a switch.
Keep it clean!
Trailers can be called upon to do some pretty dirty and unpleasant work at times. Whether you’re using a cage trailer for hauling rubbish, a heavy duty trailer for garden waste, or a tipper trailer for transporting soil or sand, you are going to need to give your trailer a thorough clean on a fairly regular basis to maintain its structural integrity.
Our trailers are manufactured in Adelaide from RHS steel and checker plate, and then etched, primed and painted with industrial dark grey enamel, so they are very robust and durable. But even our trailers will begin to suffer if they are left uncleaned for extended periods of time, as this can result in a potentially damaging build up of dirt, debris and soluble salts. A good hosing down and a scrub with a heavy brush at regular intervals will usually do the trick, however.
A good tip for when your box trailer or cage trailer is not being used is to store it with the front raised, so that water doesn’t have the chance to pool in places where it can potentially cause erosion and other damage.
More trailer tips and advice
We have one of the best ranges of trailer for sale in SA, and all of our locally-built trailers are designed for our local weather and conditions. If you need advice on how to maintain your trailer and keep it in good working order, or just want to find out more about our full range of Adelaide trailers, contact Basic Trailers or call Sam on 1300 770 770.
