Advice on car trailer - Torsion axles v leaf springs?

ozpacman · 01-12-2022, 10:17 PM

G'day all. I'm presently keeping an eye out for a car trailer to buy and am after your opinions. One of the trailers for sale locally has a torsion axle setup. My immediate thought was to avoid it, but probably only because I'm not familiar with them.

Does anyone have any experiences with them. I'm aware that a lot of caravans run torsion type axle set ups, but are they suited to car trailers do you think? I'm interested to hear your thoughts.

Dr Terry · 02-12-2022, 07:44 AM

I've run a torsion axle car trailer since the early 80s, no problems at all. I've carried everything on it, cars up to 2 tonne & all types of workshop equipment.

Simple, durable & maintenance free, go for it.

Dr Terry

Trevor 57 · 02-12-2022, 08:25 AM

i had ALKO torsion suspension on a caravan, it was fantastic. I would recommend it for a car trailer

https://alko.com.au/product/solution...spension-axle/

ozpacman · 03-12-2022, 12:01 AM

Thanks very much for your responses gents - much appreciated.

jstanovic · 03-12-2022, 06:06 PM

I thought the torsion suspension was setup to work best at a certain weight? Too heavy for their rating wasn't good for them? Seems others have no issues though.

Leaves are tried and tested but not the smoothest (especially trailer springs...).

ozpacman · 04-12-2022, 08:52 PM

Unfortunately I got pipped at the post and just missed out on the trailer subject of this thread. I appreciate the input though. Never know, another similarly suspended one might pop up in the future and I'll be armed with the knowledge that they're a good thing!

Thanks again guys.

prktkljokr · 04-12-2022, 10:53 PM

Never really had a problem with either type, just did a 400 k round trip to pick up a damaged car from Busselton with my ex caravan car trailer http://www.fordforums.com.au/showthread.php?t=11493407, wouldn't have known it was on the back apart from taking off from the lights, sat on cruse control @ 110 there and back, last torsion trailer I used was pretty much the same.

I really don't think its the trailer itself you have to worry about, its more how its loaded the loaded weight and the vehicle you are towing it with, many a fool has come unstuck by loading a car backward on a car trailer and not getting the weight over the front of the wheels.

PooDog · 05-12-2022, 07:13 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by prktkljokr

Never really had a problem with either type, just did a 400 k round trip to pick up a damaged car from Busselton with my ex caravan car trailer http://www.fordforums.com.au/showthread.php?t=11493407, wouldn't have known it was on the back apart from taking off from the lights, sat on cruse control @ 110 there and back, last torsion trailer I used was pretty much the same.

I really don't think its the trailer itself you have to worry about, its more how its loaded the loaded weight and the vehicle you are towing it with, many a fool has come unstuck by loading a car backward on a car trailer and not getting the weight over the front of the wheels.

That is so true .....you must have more weight between the trailer axles and tow coupling than behind it ......seen some real bad accidents because of to much weight out the back