Trailer failure....

Had a bad day.

Just discovered that 2 of the bunks on my trailer broke and are falling into the crossbar! This is holding my Sanger V215 up for now, but I have to get it welded.

The trailer was manufactured in 2004, never seen salt water, been on one 4 hour road trip, travels 4 miles to the lake, always stored indoors in the winter and because of a complicated pregnancy last year, never saw any action last season! It seems really premature for any problem like this to happen.

The Sanger dealer we bought it from is now defunct and I don't know of any other dealers in Washington State. I need to call the manufacturer tomorrow to see if they can do anything.

Anyone else have similar stories with trailers that came with Sangers 2005? I have to pull the paperwork on who the made the trailer, but there is a sticker on the trailer that says "Sport Boats", not sure if that has to do with Sanger or the trailer manufacturer.

HD

Welcome to the club... Let me know what the manu says.. Mines an 06

@Richard, you had the same thing happen? Did you just have it re-welded?

yeah fixed it myself.. welded a small plate ontop of the tube then welded the bunk brace to that...

i can tell further down the road im gonna have more problems on the rest of them...

Tube trailers seem to die from the inside out and you never see the failure coming. I still prefer a channel type trailer for the long haul.

Wow, I better keep my eye on that. I have the same boat, 2006. Thanks for the tip. I would give a call to Don at the Pro Shop in Longview - he may have an idea or two for you. And maybe he'll be able to offer some insight to the frequency of this type of problem... Let us know what you hear

Yeah tube trailer can rust from the inside out, but not usually from the top.

Is this on the same bunk? if so it might not be welded right for your boat.

No 2 different bunks.

That's a very common problem on the Sport Boat trailers, there was a rash of them in the last couple of years. My buddies '05 V215 did the same and he took it back to them in Patterson to fix it.

From what I noticed it has nothing to do with rusting at all. Its all about putting that small point of contact (the bunk mount) smack in the middle of the tube. Its basically pile driving into the tube as you drive and bounce down the road. Eventually it punches through the tube. Check the rest of the mounts you'll notice them all starting to crack. Look at other trailers, they are welded to the face of the tube and typically last much longer. Piss Poor design which I believe they changed after acouple years..

You may want to look at some sort of electronic rust protection in the future. Down here when we import US made trailers we can get a set up that runs off a 12v battery that stops rust corrosion. Its called couplertech. Otherwise go alloy or galvanised.

This post is 5 years old but the couplertech would be an interesting thread of it's own.

I had the same thing happen to my Sport Boats trailer a couple years ago. Mine was an '01 and I called them up to talk about it and they picked the boat and trailer up the next week, gusseted all the supports, put new carpet on and re-painted it. I was pretty impressed that they would stand up for a failing product that was about 7 years old at the time. I do live within an hour of their plant which made it a lot easier, but give them a call. They're good people.

Wow.. Thats great customer service! Maybe ill contact them.

Where are they located?

Zach, that is good to hear. I just called, no answer just voicemail, so hopefully they'll get back to me.

Richard, they are in Patterson, CA.

HD

I have called Sport Boat a few times and got no calls back. I would just take it to your local small time 4x4 fabricator and have them fix it like Richard did. A little plate to spread out the surface area and should be good to go. If you could take the boat off the trailer, get all the paint ground off around it and make the plate yourself it should be really cheap and quick to fix. i'd do it for you but gas money to norcal you could probably just buy a new trailer. good luck

That aint even a good pic and I can see the rust. The issue with a weld on tube is the backside of the weld burns off any protection, recieves no paint and just abour immediately begins to rust. With a channel type trailer both sides of the weld are sealed from the elements through refinishing.

I didnt notice much rust at all on mine. I have one that is actually kinda sunken into the tube but is still holding. Im sure it will pop soon through.

As mentioned above I dropped my boat in the lake brought it to the shop and had it fixed in about a half hour.

I agree that channel trailers will live longer due to the reasons Sparky Jay mentioned, but these failures are 100% a design issue IMO. Rust does not cause cracking in steel, but fatigue does. I'd recommend having all the mounts gusseted when you get it repaired. It shouldn't be that expensive - my guess is less than $500.

I saw Richard's trailer up close, and I'm sure the cause of the failure was not from rust. It was just a poor design. The tube is only like 1/8" wall. There is no way it could support the weight of the riser. If it were mine, I would do what Richard did and weld a plate under the broken pieces. Then I would gusset all of them like this to spread the load. I might even run them all the way up to the bottom of the bunk

This happened to me too. They must have had the summer student design this trailer. It is %100 failure due to bad design. There is no stuctural support. All the strength of that tube is through the side.

^^ Which is the way all welded trailers I've ever seen are built, and anyone with metal fab experience would have designed it! ^^

The original design is also stupid because it allows for no adjustment at fitup. All the vertical supports have to be the exact perfect length, or the bunk will have waves in it.

Certainly agree with the design arguement. Welds almost always fail right next to the weld. The metal is hardened by the heat of the weld, leaving it prone to cracking. Leave the weld uncovered, such as in the case of a tube trailer and rust sets in quick. Eventually the rust will contribute to an early failure as opposed to a weld that is kept from rusting on BOTH sides. The tube trailers Ive worked on are only mild, untreated steel and are very rusty on the inside after only a few years. Just something to consider when deciding between the two.

I had to get a new SBT this year and drove my ass to Patterson from Seattle, holy crap that was a tough trip. Any way its my opinion that SBT is a pain in the ass to deal with. They are slow to return phone calls if they do at all and honstly just kinda weird people. I will say I love my new trailer but the whole ordeal was a real PTA.

I called Sport Boat twice and no reply yet. It has been almost a week. I talked to Sanger and since they do not make the trailer, they could not help. They did say that Sport Boat was delivering a trailer today and they would talk to them about returning my phone call. That was cool of Sanger, but I don't know how much good it will do.