Dumper trailer choice

[Rosohatica]

Hi, I am in the process of buying a dumper trailer, mostly for firewood. I have hilly terrain and often muddy.
I am considering between these two trailers for my Kubota L3200. The first one is cca $500 more expensive. None of them has brakes. What would by your opinion be a better choice?

NELA T963/3 ( 2900 pounds capacity) , tipping on 3 sides, size of the basket 95x43 inches - made in EU

T963 Nela single axle agricultural trailer - Metal-Fach

Versatile The T963 NELA trailer is a unit that stands out for its versatility and ease of use. Nela Contact Ask for an individual offer Fill out the form and our consultant will contact you as soon as possible. Please fill out all fields marked *. Location Fill out the form with your details Mr. […]

www.metalfach.com.pl

and GEO RM 25 ( 5500 pounds capacity) , tipping on 1 side, size of the basket 82x55 inches - made in China

RM 25 DUAL AXLE DUMPER TRAILER - Geo Agric agricultural implements - Italy

www.geo-agric.com

 

[TheOldHokie]

Hi, I am in the process of buying a dumper trailer, mostly for firewood. I have hilly terrain and often muddy.
I am considering between these two trailers for my Kubota L3200. The first one is cca $500 more expensive. None of them has brakes. What would by your opinion be a better choice?

NELA T963/3 ( 2900 pounds capacity) , tipping on 3 sides, size of the basket 95x43 inches - made in EU

View attachment 165903

T963 Nela single axle agricultural trailer - Metal-Fach

Versatile The T963 NELA trailer is a unit that stands out for its versatility and ease of use. Nela Contact Ask for an individual offer Fill out the form and our consultant will contact you as soon as possible. Please fill out all fields marked *. Location Fill out the form with your details Mr. […]

www.metalfach.com.pl

and GEO RM 25 ( 5500 pounds capacity) , tipping on 1 side, size of the basket 82x55 inches - made in China

View attachment 165901

RM 25 DUAL AXLE DUMPER TRAILER - Geo Agric agricultural implements - Italy

www.geo-agric.com

I think you need brakes.

Dan

 

[BAP]

Personally I’d want the one with tandem wheels for more stability

 

[mikester]

#2 looks better with dual wheels. I hope you have a weld shop in the garage to fix chinese welding and fabricate structural repairs and improvements.

Check out the actual trailer weights not the optimistically rated "carrying capacity" on a sticker.

 

[Rosohatica]

I think you need brakes.

Dan

Yeah, unfortunatelly niether has them. But look at this idea for brakes:

 

[GreensvilleJay]

tandem axle unit !!! wins hands down . As BAP says more stable, can disconnect and it NOT tip back. Agree brakes would be nice, can be added later( electric is easy..)

 

[Rosohatica]

tandem axle unit !!! wins hands down . As BAP says more stable, can disconnect and it NOT tip back. Agree brakes would be nice, can be added later( electric is easy..)

Thanks, what do you mean by "can disconnect"?

 

[g_man]

The Geo-Agric would be my choice. The walking beam axles are way better in the woods or rough ground if that matters to you. The removable sides gives you a lot of flexibility. But you have a light tractor and it may be a tad big in some situations if you fright it right up. Your manual must give you some trailer number for tongue weight and trailer weight. My L3010, which is similar to the L3200, is spec'ed for 3000 lbs for trailer wt. But that seems conservative from my experience

gg

 

[GrumpyFarmer]

Good day.

Personally I would go with whichever has highest weight capacity (but look at the frame and make sure the comparing apples to apples) and I would also look at the tires and the ratings there.

I would opt for the tandem (especially if tandem articulates) pending above items.

the other consideration I would have is whether or not you plan to move the trailer manual at all yourself. I’m f frequent for storage or parking I’d rather try to push a single axle trailer.

I think from an impact to the ground, especially when loaded, the tandem is the way to go.

If planning on road use id check the tire ratings….the tandem to me doesn’t look like road rated tire (but I really don’t know that from eyeball a picture)

at a glance the geo artic looks a little heftier but spec weight would confirm that. I’d look at the bones to make a judgement there.

This makes me feel dirty / ashamed to say on an orange site, but I think I would go green.

 

[hedgerow]

Hi, I am in the process of buying a dumper trailer, mostly for firewood. I have hilly terrain and often muddy.
I am considering between these two trailers for my Kubota L3200. The first one is cca $500 more expensive. None of them has brakes. What would by your opinion be a better choice?

I myself don't really care for either without brakes. If I only had those two to chose from it would be number two. Where I cut wood sounds like were you cut wood number one would be on its side the first load out of the woods.

 

[GreensvilleJay]

single axle trailers can be 'tricky' when disconnecting from tractor,when not enough 'tongue weight' is there and can fling the tongue upright PDQ ! You need to put the tongue jack down BEFORE disconnecting the tractor to be safe. A tandem tends to be 'better behaved' or 'more stable'.

 

[Lil Foot]

Double axle, hands down winner.

 

[ayak]

Braking (loaded and headed down a grade especially) ability is more important to me than being able to get it moving.

Trailer plus its load maxing out at ~2200#s
FWIW, if you haven’t already seen this:

 

[Mark_BX25D]

I have hilly terrain and often muddy.

Then you NEED brakes and you NEED more rubber than that top one. Dual wheels at least, and dual axles with dual wheels even better.

And please don't settle for any redneck engineering for your brakes.

I vote for neither one of them.

Buy the right tool, and cry once. Cheap out, and keep on crying.

 

[Tarmy]

Door number 2 OP….lower COG as well…

 

[Rosohatica]

Braking (loaded and headed down a grade especially) ability is more important to me than being able to get it moving.

Trailer plus its load maxing out at ~2200#s
FWIW, if you haven’t already seen this:

View attachment 165924

Thanks. You are right - this is what manual says. What is confusing is that plate on the tractor says that maximum towing weight is 2000 kg, which is more than this screenshots say. Drawbar is really massive and hefty btw. I have found the Kubota EK1-261 (Farmtrac) can tow a trailer with a maximum weight of
2,000 kg if it has brakes, and 1,500 kg without brakes. This is in addition to the weight of the trailer itself. EK1 looks like a toy comparing to L3200.

 

[Rosohatica]

Then you NEED brakes and you NEED more rubber than that top one. Dual wheels at least, and dual axles with dual wheels even better.

And please don't settle for any redneck engineering for your brakes.

I vote for neither one of them.

Buy the right tool, and cry once. Cheap out, and keep on crying.

Unfortunately the trailers with brakes available here are way too big and way too expensive for my needs. But I will look into electrical brakes kits.

 

[Rosohatica]

Good day.

Personally I would go with whichever has highest weight capacity (but look at the frame and make sure the comparing apples to apples) and I would also look at the tires and the ratings there.

I would opt for the tandem (especially if tandem articulates) pending above items.

the other consideration I would have is whether or not you plan to move the trailer manual at all yourself. I’m f frequent for storage or parking I’d rather try to push a single axle trailer.

I think from an impact to the ground, especially when loaded, the tandem is the way to go.

If planning on road use id check the tire ratings….the tandem to me doesn’t look like road rated tire (but I really don’t know that from eyeball a picture)

at a glance the geo artic looks a little heftier but spec weight would confirm that. I’d look at the bones to make a judgement there.

This makes me feel dirty / ashamed to say on an orange site, but I think I would go green.

Thanks for all of the considerations. You made me chuckle with the last comment - I was thinking of repainting it into orange seriously

 

[Rosohatica]

Thank you all for the opinions and advices. I appreciate it all. Most of you leaned towards the GEO (green) one. So I decided to buy it. It will arrive later in the day today. I decided to look into getting electrical brakes. However I have several question marks over my head. First one is - are those wheels too small for electrical brake drum? And if I add just one drum per side - will the wheel with the drum stick out? If it does, is it a problem? Or just aesthetically not pleasing?

 

[GrumpyFarmer]

Thanks for all of the considerations. You made me chuckle with the last comment - I was thinking of repainting it into orange seriously

No problem.
Congratulations.
I think you’ll find the dumper to greatly reduce handling.

whether you find a reasonable solution for brakes or not, I think key thing is really consider your approach and deparcher and where you park the machine. I have several hilly properties, I dont have trailer brakes (yes shame on me), and to be clear should you start sliding brakes don’t necessarily help it if you are sliding. Having a trailer on the back also will not help you if you are sliding. Honestly I’d rather have back up lights than brakes on my trailer, maybe if I were on the road more brakes would be more helpful…off road operator controls the speed, the gear and rpm’s - be careful and take your time)

After a wrinkling my vinyl seat a few times, I now only go on the hills when the ground condition is right for your tasks / chores.

Go as slow as possible and as fast as necessary. (Have a plan ahead of time where you plan to stop/park, Keep it in a low gear, use the throttle to slow down until you need to stop).

what I have found is that once I start to drag a log out, I keep dragging it until I get to a place where I will pile (or where I can grab with the grapple) them that I can safely reach with the wagon and safely park it. Then I cut them there and use the wagon from the staging point. Sometimes that means I get everything cut up at the parking spot, but save the shuttling with the wagon for a dryer ground condition day.

I think you will enjoy the dump capability. It’s like have several extra hands helping. (Keep an eye on your tail gate if you have to remove it to dump…don’t lean it on your tires because you will find out that to completely dump the bed you have to pull forward a little…if you forget you staged tail gate on the tire, it’s gonna leave a mark).

good luck. (Send us some pics)