So I had a crazy idea I thought I'd throw out here for discussion.

Always looking for ways to pull a Jeep behind 5th wheel that would be legal in BC where towing doubles is not allowed. Right now I have a short 5th wheel on a 30ft GN. Works ok but would be nice to have something smaller for trips where the Jeep stays home.

Anyway, I saw some inexpensive wrecker wheel lifts for 3/4ton and 1 ton trucks. Meant for light duty use. I'm thinking it would be cool to mount one on the back of a 5th wheel and tow the Jeep on that, front wheels in the air rear wheels on the ground.

Some problems I see:

Too much weight on the back causing front to unload, maybe corrected by engineering the lift to put weight on front of trailer and an extra axle.

Is the frame/hitch strong enough on a 5th wheel for this extra weight?

Would LE still see it as a double setup?

Most 5ths have the tanks at the back making access to the frame difficult.

Looking for positive/creative ideas here not 2000 people telling me how crazy I am. Wife does that just fine thanks!

 

Not sure on what your frame is. From what I've seen on the bare frames it might wirk with reinforcement. Where is this lift your talking about?

 

You mean like a Sneaker Wheel Lift under the rear bumper of the RV? Would they see that as towing double?

You need a Toy Hauler. Are you interested in one of them? Jeep would go right in the back.

 

It would unload the front of the trailer too much. Waaaay tooo much!

Flat tow the Jeep with a tow bar and 4 down.

LE would feel obligated to pull you over and write you up for something!

Make a hillbilly toyhauler. Put a travel trailer body or truck camper on the front of a long GN flatbed and Jeep on the back. Many have done nice ones.

Make a bolted hitch (like on the other thread about towing doubles going now) and claim you have an "articulated" trailer, not a double. Still will attract LE.

 

You didn't read my first post close enough, I've got a "redneck toyhauler" now.



Trying to simplify/lighten things up a bit. Its deck is 30ft, weighs in around 17K with the Jeep on it and isn't really practical to go on vacation with it without taking the Jeep. Works pretty good for local random camping but would like something lighter/smaller for more longer trips.

As much as I like the idea I just can not see it working, not enough tongue weight..... not giving up though, still thinking.....

 

Sorry, missed that. Check out CrazyCooters articulated hitch post.

Well, if you put the wheel lift on the Dodge and if it had a receiver, like many do, you could hook a bumper pull trailer to the Jeep and wheel lift the Jeep with the Dodge like a wrecker would haul it!

OK, Ok. IF the articulated hitch is legal.... Get a short GN for the Jeep and pull a bumper pull TT with articulated hitch. Then you could do any combination of trailers and be able to trailer the Jeep in case of breakage on the trail.

 

I believe your answer lies with this statement, "towing doubles is not allowed." I have to believe your local constabulary is gonna view any rig with more than one hitch point as doubles. Wheel lift not withstanding. But it sounds like an interesting thought game and I like a challenge.
You will need to re-enforce the trailer frame. I don't think a camper frame is going to have anywhere near the strength. You are going to have to come up with a power source and a hydraulic system to run the lift. Electric/hydraulic comes to mind with a battery on the trailer and a charge wire off the truck sounds simplest. I am not sure if wreckers have gone wireless yet, but Century had a wired remote that was handy. Three switches for up/down, in/out and tilt at the end of a 10' cable. The trailer suspension will need to be beefed up to handle the additional load. Air bags would do and the pump could be wired in to the power wire from the truck. For the additional weight, the trailer brakes might need to be upgraded. Speaking of additional weight, you are probably going to have to add close to 2000# of additional weight at the pin. By the time you measure the distance from between the trailer axles (fulcrum) to the hubs on the Jeep on the lift, I am guessing it will be pretty close to the distance forward to the pin. Not too worried about the truck, but that trailer is getting heavy. Ground clearance below the lift could be an issue. Depending on the mounting, a tilted lift hangs close to a foot below it's mount. Are you planning to notch the back of the fifth wheel? I believe you will need to in order to tilt the lift enough. I think I see lockouts on the hubs of the Jeep which should be a good thing. Back in the day, wheel lifting Jeeps with Quadra Trac was a no no! Have I missed anything? Good luck! Post pictures!

 

I have been following this thread interseted in how it goes, I was looking at your pics again and I know it would be a lot of work but I'll throw this out there.
You want a shorter, lighter trailer "for when the jeep stays home". What if the jeep loads further forward and partially under the camper? Imagine a cut away like the front but on the back as well. You may not need an extra bed but it could be cupboards above the kitchen counter and storage from the outside. You could even put the kitchen counter up there and raise the floor in that area. It would cut down on floor space but could drastically shorten the flatdeck. if the part of the flatdeck where the jeep goes was lower (between the wheels) you could get the jeep even further forward and would make loading easier.

The easiest way to accomplish this would be start with a much shorter car hauler trailer (deck already low) and raise the camper above the deck. This would give the clearance for the jeep and also give lots of easy accessible storage under the camper. good luck.

 

Now we're talking!

I had not considered putting the Jeep on a short GN and pulling a bumper pull TT behind that. It would definatly solve the issue of wanting to take out one without the other. In Alberta doubles are ok but not in BC. I typically only go to BC once a year though but since its farther its ususally the one I want to tow the Jeep to. I going to think about that option some more.

One thought I had about the 5th wheel/wheel lift thing was instead of a wheel lift was to drop a shorter 5th wheel on to a 20 or 22ft low boy gooseneck. This would leave about 4 feet of deck space that I could pull just the front wheels of the Jeep up onto and then "dolly" it with the wheels on the ground. Still have the issue of unloading the front of the GN. Also because its a low boy/drop deck the wheel wells of the GN would have to match up with the wheel wells on the 5th wheel. I'm guessing this would put the GN wheels father forward and unload the hitch even more.

One other thing I'm striving for is to lower the door height of the 5th wheel. Both the wife and our 3yr old managed to fall down the steps last summer which is a bit over 3 feet. No serious injuries atleast. 3yr old was pushing on the screen door which was held closed with a magnet latch. Finally pushed hard enough to pop the door open and out she went....