[Shop-talk] 2 by's for truck ramp

[Eric J Russell]

For many years I used a pair of 8' long 2 X 10's as ramps for my car
trailer. I added rabbeted 2 X 4's along the sides to make then into
wide H beams. They would carry the weight of MG's and a Toyota
4-Runner with no visible deflection. I also used them to load my
motorcycle (~ 700+ lbs) into the bed of my truck.

attempt at sketch:
                    __________________
                |   |______2 x 10_______|  |
                |      |                             |      |    2 x 4
                |___|                             |___|



When a nephew used them to put his full size Chevy 4 X 4 onto the
trailer, he managed to split one along its length. The planks were
many years old with visible cracks in them already thus should have
been replaced. I found out later that the oversize tires on his 4 X 4
were too wide to fit inside the trailer's fenders and he had tried to
drive the truck up over the fenders. He admitted it took a lot of
tries with his truck bouncing up & down as he tried to get it all the
way up onto the trailer so that likely way over-loaded those planks.

My current trailer loading ramps are 3 layers of 1/2" exterior plywood
(12" W X 8' long) glued & screwed together onto 2 X 4's I cut into
arched shapes. This bow shape seems to give them more strength and it
helps avoid scraping the undercarriage as the MG gets up onto the
trailer.

Eric Russell
Mebane, NC
http://home.mebtel.net/~ejrussell