Hauling a Motorcycle Behind 5'er?

[JayC]

A friend of mine just bought a motorcycle and wants to get ideas about hauling it along when he pulls his 35' Prowler fifth wheel trailer. He thought about welding a receiver onto the rear of the trailer to pull a trailer, but he will be over the legal length. He is now thinking about a lift mechanism to haul the cycle across the rear. Will adding about a thousand pounds to the rear make the trailer impossible to travel without swaying too much?

Any input will be appreciated.

[JayC]

A friend of mine just bought a motorcycle and wants to get ideas about hauling it along when he pulls his 35' Prowler fifth wheel trailer. He thought about welding a receiver onto the rear of the trailer to pull a trailer, but he will be over the legal length. He is now thinking about a lift mechanism to haul the cycle across the rear. Will adding about a thousand pounds to the rear make the trailer impossible to travel without swaying too much?

Any input will be appreciated.

[FatDog]

wow
that will change the dynamics of that tow IF that trailer's frame will handle that much additional stress. and it WILL change the pin weight effecting steering
'a thousand pounds' puts that bike into the large streetbike category, more weight then i would ever personally strap to a c-channel trailer frame designed to hold a 14,000 pound distributed trailer

[Vette Racer]

Yep, time for a toyhauler!

[TXiceman]

As already stated, hanging 1000# on the tail end of a 5er is a BAD idea. It will unload the pin (ie lighter pin weight) and will certainly overload the frame on the back of the 5er.

Like Tom said...time fro a toyhauler.

Ken

[WWFan]

Well guys, but you know, he's halfway there with a TH...maybe we just need to get the gals to reload the trucks, and go off into the sunset to do what we were gonna have to do to 56's rig- this should be alot simpler- just a door in the back.

Seriously, JayC...toyboxes already have all that engineerin' built into them. Time to "bite the bullet"!

[C.CARNEY]

Well guys, this is the problem I now have!!! I was able to take the bike everywhere with the TH, but now I'm not sure what I'm going to do. It was a trade off, but we decided to go with the new high end over the TH. I was looking at someway of carrying my bike, a 500 lb Honda. The back end of the trailer frame is VERY stout, but I just don't know if I want to add on a rack. My pin weight is around 2400 lbs, so I'm not to worried about 500 lbs. I guess I could look at hanging it off the front of the truck, but I'm really in a quandry right now. If the bike has to stay home, bummer, but when I sit back and look out the picture windows, well it's worth it!!!

Clark

[TXiceman]

Clark, it is not just a matter of extending some steel to mount a bracket on and support 500# plus of bike, it gets into the dynamics of a 500# weight hung at the end of a beam and the amount of oscillations and vibrations while bouncing down the highway. You hang 500# out two, three or 4 feet on a steel frame with no real support, you will get some tremendous stress devloping at the attachment point on the frame.

I would not hang that much weight out there with out some sort of support on the upper part of the frame/rack.

Ken

[gearman]

Here is how I carry my bike. I also pull a trailer behind if I am going to take the 4 wheelers as well. Both work very well.

I see many 5ths and motorhomes going down the road with a fulldress road bike on a rack or lift of some sort on back, and some with a large 4-wheeler on a rack. These will put you into the 1000 lbs area. I follow behind to check out there set up, I have never seen one sway or look like it it out of balance.

Would I ever put more weight on the back of my trailer? Sure, but first I would have the right rack to handle the weight.

I do not notice any towing difference with or without my current bike on back (bike weights in @ 256 lbs and the rack @ approx 75 lbs.).


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[RustyJC]

Yes, but the original inquiry stated that there would be a 1000 lb cantilever load hanging off the back of the 5th wheel's frame. That's a completely different ballgame!!!

Rusty