The trucking industry offers many types of trailers to haul your cargo the right way.
Evan Transportation and A-1 Trailer & Container, Inc. specialize in renting and leasing containers, trailers, and local cartage/road trailers. Since we’ve been in business since 1996, we’ve seen trailers evolve and helped customers pick the best type for them. It can be challenging to decide the purpose of each trailer and which is best for your freight, with various trailers being on the road today. You can look forward to having a selection of over 600 trailers at competitive prices. Here is a breakdown of the most common types of trailers.
Dry Van
Dry van trailers are the ideal solution for the shipment of pallet-based, boxed, or loose commodities. This option is the most common, typically measuring 53 feet, and ships commonly-used products. Some of the world’s largest corporations, such as Walmart, use this type of trailer to transport their inventories. Inventory, such as household goods and non-perishable food items, is best for dry van trailers.
A dry van trailer’s enclosed container keeps materials safe with a maximum weight of 42,000-45,000 pounds. Note that the encasement of the products inside and the inability of its floors to support a lot of weight, these trailers should not carry oversized loads like a flatbed can.
Flatbed
A flatbed trailer is also ubiquitous. These trailers are versatile and often haul steel, construction equipment, lumber, and open-air commodities such as art and cottage industry goods such as yarn and textiles. These trailers come in various sizes ranging from 24, 40, 45, 48, and 53 feet. However, the 48-foot flatbed has frequent uses.
Flatbed trailers rest five feet off the ground and can haul a maximum capacity of 48,000 pounds. A flatbed’s open sides and back are excellent for loading and unloading via forklift or overhead crane. Any freight’s full height and width using these trailers should be 8 feet, 6 inches.
Since flatbed trailers don’t have containers to house their products like a dry bed, you can use a standard flatbed trailer to haul oversized freight. However, you must acquire the necessary permits and follow the proper routes. It would be best if you also secured all trailers with chains, straps, and various tarping solutions.
Refrigerated
Refrigerated trailers, or reefers, move any freight requiring temperature control. A reefer’s temperature control and insulated walls make them the only type of trailer suitable for hauling perishable items. Products such as fruit, pharmaceuticals, and icecreams are common goods transported on this type of trailer.
Like a dry van, reefers have a maximum weight capacity of 42,000-45,000 pounds. The maximum height that a refrigerator trailer can haul is 8 feet and 8 feet, 2 inches, with the greatest width being 8 feet, 2 inches. This precise measurement is because of a reefer trailer’s insulated walls.
Drop-Deck
Drop-deck, also known as step-deck trailers, come in handy as an alternative to a flatbed trailer when a load’s height is a factor. A drop-deck trailer has an upper deck and a low rear section that can haul loads at a maximum of 10 feet, 2 inches in height, before they become too tall or disproportionate.
These trailers commonly transport agricultural and building materials and various types of machinery. Drop-deck trailers are shorter than flatbeds, measuring 3 feet, 6 inches at their lowest point. In a 53-foot version of a drop-deck trailer, the upper and lower deck lengths are 10 and 43 feet, respectively.
These four trailers listed don’t even begin to cover the wide range of trailers you can select. However, they are the most common. Contact Evan Transportation today whenever you’re ready to have various types of trailers at your disposal.
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