trailer hitch

The hitch is mounted on the inside ( between the bike & the car ) lower frame rail of the sidecar. I know on mine it already has the receiver portion for a trailer built in and it is just part of the lower frame rail of the sidecar frame that comes out the rear of the sidecar. This stuff will likely be car specific and if you know a welder, that would likely be the best way to go, as he or she could likely add a receiver. I doubt you will find one that is an aftermarket add on, as these are normally sidecar specific and usually an option, as it is built in before the car body goes on. You might want to check the hack section of advrider, lots of stuff on that site.

You may want to reconsider. Hannigan discussed this with me when I ordered my sidecar and strongly suggested I keep my trailer hitch directly behind the driveline. I'm hauling a Kwik Kamp tent trailer that grosses 500 lbs. and that much weight off center with a sidecar? I don't think so. I told him I had already decided to keep the hitch behind the driveline and deal with the few inches of extra width. M2CYMMV......

Thanks for getting back to me you guys. Hey ocpd44 . Loaded up my kwik Kamp weighs about the same as yours. I have a question for you.... Seems to me that if you position the trailer off the back end of the motorcycle then it is off center.... if it is positioned inbetween the motorcycle and the car then it it is centered ???? or is this something I am not understanding ??

Bone,

The trailer should be in line with the drivetrain. The sidecar already puts off-center inertia on the rig. If you move the trailer out of the line of the drivetrain, you are adding more weight to that inertia. That means when you stop or start, there will be more of a tendency for the rig to swing left or right respectively. Keeping the trailer in line with the drivetrain eliminates the added off-center inertia (the inertia is still there, just in-line where it is easier to control).

The downside to keeping the trailer directly behind the bike is that the entire rig may be a few inches wider. I don't see this as as much of a problem as trying to control the added off-center inertia. There are some on the forum that have a preference for the off-center due to the width but no one can argue the laws of physics.

Does this make sense?

Jeff

ocpd44 - 10/8/2017 9:21 PM

Bone,

The trailer should be in line with the drivetrain. The sidecar already puts off-center inertia on the rig. If you move the trailer out of the line of the drivetrain, you are adding more weight to that inertia. That means when you stop or start, there will be more of a tendency for the rig to swing left or right respectively. Keeping the trailer in line with the drivetrain eliminates the added off-center inertia (the inertia is still there, just in-line where it is easier to control).

The downside to keeping the trailer directly behind the bike is that the entire rig may be a few inches wider. I don't see this as as much of a problem as trying to control the added off-center inertia. There are some on the forum that have a preference for the off-center due to the width but no one can argue the laws of physics.

Does this make sense?

Jeff

Yes sir that makes sense...... But, "there's always a but, eh!" Here is my problem. First off I have been pulling my kwik kamp with my gl1800 "two wheeler" with no problems. I recently bought a new to me gl1500 with a CSC friendship 3 tub. This is my 3rd rig. It is very wide. Now for the problems. I live out in the boonies in the foot hills to Mt. St. Helens. My drive way is 1/3 mile long and basalt bed rock and loose gravel and very narrow, as in just wide enough to get the rig down and just wide enough with a little to spare to pull the Kwik Kamp up the drive way with the 1800. So, if I add the kwik Kamp behind the gl1500 I don't think I can make it in or out of the drive way. The second problem is that the over head door into my 30x48 foot shop will not be wide enough to get the rig into with the trailer directly behind the bike. And the entrance to the shop door is up a steep gravel incline and I need to keep moving to make it through the door or stall out in the gravel. This gives me no chance to kind of idle in and make sure I have lined up properly if the door would even be wide enough. This means I would have to un-hook the trailer in my yard and hook it to my 4x4 and then back it up hill into the garage. Ever try backing a trailer you can't even see in your mirrors. 🙂 So it would seem I am inbetween a rock and a hard place.

I would say do what pits your problems. I puled 3 different campers off the center of my Moto guzzi sidecar rig for 30,000 mi with no problems. People fly the chair with there rigs all the time with out thinking about the side pressure on the wheel bearings.
Lloyd

Bone
as mentioned there are a lot of different opinions about what works best when it comes to pulling trailers with the sidecar. So just to offer another, I agree that putting the hitch centered between the bike and car is a bad idea. However in my opinion putting it directly behind the bike doesn't work for me either,I have a very wide camper. So here is what I did. I took my standard hitch for the bike then using a good piece o angle iron I made an extension going towards the car, just enough so I could connect another piece of flat bar from the receiver tube on the sidecar frame. Then I took my camper and set it up behind the bike and made it sit in line with my left saddle bag
so going down the road it is in line with the bag, this way I don't have to worry about it crossing the line if I'm pulling it in the twisties. If I don't cross the line it won't.
I will say there is just a little pull and push effect but it's not bad and if you have brakes on the sidecar and or trailer very easy to control

I have pulled a Kwik Kamp over 100K behind GL's with sidecars. Always moved over from the center line of the bike to the right just enough to be on wider then I needed to be. Centered behind the "rig" sucks. Much more yaw effect on the rig.
We are located in Enumclaw if you need any fabrication done.
BTW, I have owned two GL1500's with F3 sidecars and we have one in the shop being worked on at this time.
Jay G
DMC sidecars
866-638-1793

jaydmc - 10/10/2017 8:04 AM

I have pulled a Kwik Kamp over 100K behind GL's with sidecars. Always moved over from the center line of the bike to the right just enough to be on wider then I needed to be. Centered behind the "rig" sucks. Much more yaw effect on the rig.
We are located in Enumclaw if you need any fabrication done.
BTW, I have owned two GL1500's with F3 sidecars and we have one in the shop being worked on at this time.
Jay G
DMC sidecars
866-638-1793

There you go. Take it from the expert. You appear to live close enough that it might be worth the trip to go see Jay and have a consultation with him about the best way to resolve the issues. I know what you mean about the width. When I got my new rig home from Kentucky, I found I could no longer pull into my single car garage! Oh well, more motivation to clean the other garage out.

Thanks for the feedback you guys. Before I posted this I was going to line up the trailer wheel with the rear tire on the motorcycle and see where the side of the trailer came out as far as the motorcycle goes. So it looks like I am on the right track considering my problems. I should have time today to go check on that. Maybe I can even take a pic and post it here. There is a brake on the side car but not on the trailer and the side car has electric tilt.

Jay, I will definitely take you up doing the work for me if I run into troubles when I get around to doing this.

Nothing I do allows me to post a pic. NOTHING ! I even went to the help forum and read through all the info I could find. Nothing works. I must be stuuuupid or something. I need someone to tell me step by step how to do this. This seems like the most archaic way I have ever seen to post a pic. Why not just be able to drag and drop your pic into the message reply box like the other forums I belong to. To many extra steps here !!!!

the way I do it is I make a post and save it, then go back and open it by clicking the edit button in the top right of the post, then when it reopens go to the bottom and go past you post and you will see add attachments
this lefts you brouse your PC for the picture you want.
Now if your trying this from a phone I have no clue

AJ1200 - 10/12/2017 5:01 AM

the way I do it is I make a post and save it, then go back and open it by clicking the edit button in the top right of the post, then when it reopens go to the bottom and go past you post and you will see add attachments
this lefts you brouse your PC for the picture you want.
Now if your trying this from a phone I have no clue

ok, thanks AJ I will give that a try.

Ok. I am going to try and post a pic. Hope it works.

Before I get to involved with pulling my kwik kamp I have a question. If the pic shows up that should explain it.
The text in the pic is quite small. If you can't read it , it says Is this flimsy joint strong enough to pull a trailer as well as the side car.
My trailer weighs between 500 and 600 lbs. And is the 1500 strong enough to pull this kind of weight riding two up ? I weigh about 160 lbs and my partner is around 140 lbs.