For all of you fans of really doing a lot with a bike, check out Haulin’ Colin’s Bike Cargo Trailers. Dave Shapiro alerted us to these great cargo haulin’ machines handmade in Seattle, Washington with the alert that they now have production models available. If you are looking for a large capacity bike trailer, you’re in luck. Dave has the trailers listed at $750 including free shipping (not sure if this means within the continental US). There are also “quantity discounts available and reduced rates for community organizations”. And beyond the production model all sorts of custom options are available and being made by the guys that are selling the product, it is quite likely that they can come up with all sorts of interesting solutions to solve your cargo hauling needs.
Taking a look through the Haulin’ Colin blog photos of the trailer, I was very impressed by it’s robust yet simple design. The body of the trailer looks very rugged and impressive with its diamond plated steel loadbed. 6 solid support bars support the upper rail which looks like you would be able to use for resting items wider than the wheels on. Speaking of the wheels, the beam around offers the ability for both a simple, strong wheel mounting point as well as offering protection for the wheels. The double bar hitch arm inspires confidence and integrates into the trailer body with what appears to be support beams spurring off. Attached to what appears to be a well thought out heavy-duty bike trailer hitch, this trailer should be able to setup for serious loads.
Unlike two wheel bike trailers with lower load capacities, this heavy load capacity bike trailers must solve the problem of offering up a more rugged bike trailer hitch. In looking at the impressive Haulin’ Colin hitch design, I figured I should make a few quick notes on bike trailer hitch design. Bike trailer hitches are an important factor in the consideration that determines the lower load capacity (typically 75 to 100 pounds) of most bike cargo, pet and baby trailers. Simple hitch designs by Burley, Chariot and Croozer, are easy to install and use and are also simple enough in design and materials so that they are quite affordable. For heavy-duty bike trailer like Haulin’ Colin, a more robust hitch solution is needed. Haulin Colin’s solution looks well-though out, simple and robust. Utilizing a clamp for the seat stay and chain stay joined to a cross-member/stabalizer with the pivoting hitch point at the bottom, this hitch design offers up a solution that is both very tough yet simple enough to mount to most bikes.
In comparing this hitch design to the other heavy-duty bike trailer hitch designs that we are aware of, Bikes-At-Work and Surly’s new “The Trailer”, Colin’s offers a nice balance of simplicity and usability. The Bikes-At-Work solution is a little bit to simple and grassroots while, the Surly seems to be a little bit more over built than is necessary. Calling something overbuilt is not necessarily a negative especially when it comes to heavy duty bike trailers, and I do give props to Surly for the innovative work they put into their hitch design. One real advantage of the Surly Trailer’s hitch design is its ability to work with a wide variety of bikes. Both the Bikes-At-Work and Haulin Colin’s design are limited to working with bike that have frames with positions for mounting the hitches to. With this thought, both of these hitch design could have some impact on the frames finish depending on how they are installed and should definitely not be attached to carbon fiber frames.
But I digress. My main point here is to check out the great heavy duty bike trailers being made in Seattle. It is great to see the heavy-cargo side of bike trailering starting to open up with these great trailers along with Surley’s new “The Trailer”.