# How to haul a horse and vehicle?



## horselovinguy (Oct 1, 2013)

I can't give you pictures but I've seen quite a few going down the road or at trail-heads unloading.
If you are referring to doing this with a stock, then you will need a larger trailer since you need floor space and room for "all" of your horse from nose to tail to fit with head held at a comfortable angle in his section of the trailer.
I'm guessing you need a 16' trailer as it is cut in half...gives enough horse room but just as important it gives room for your conveyance to fit and be secured to the floor in the trailer...yes, those with nice wheeled carts have d-rings like you use in a car trailer to secure those carts they not move during travel and get damaged.
So, what I see is horse{s} in front of trailer, closed center slam gate and then then cart/buggy/whatever in the back.
Some have a ramp, most have movable ramps like car ramps they unload with.
Harness is neatly placed on top of the conveyance or hung inside off of harness hooks.
I caution you to make a plan to keep your harness weather-proofed if you use a stock trailer and get caught in the rain...water can get inside the trailers at times.
As for cart in truck back...going to get old real fast when you need to unhitch to remove it and replace it. 
And who is going to help you lift it up there or push it up that steep angle??
Figure that out for pulling it back into the trailer by yourself or train the horse to back it in for you, then you need to figure out how to load the horse and where though..
You need to be self-sufficient and think me, myself and I not who can I borrow...
Good luck.
:runninghorse2:....
_jmo..._


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## ducky1234 (May 2, 2017)

horselovinguy said:


> As for cart in truck back...going to get old real fast when you need to unhitch to remove it and replace it.
> And who is going to help you lift it up there or push it up that steep angle??
> _jmo..._


My stock trailer was fine with a pony in the front and a pony cart in back and like you said, it's a lot easier that way. For my full size cart (too wide for trailer), I've bought two folding ramps (dirt cheap off craigslist) and I installed a hand winch on the truck (behind driver on top of bed quarterpanel) as I can't push the cart alone up into the full sized bed. (Two people makes it easy winchless.)


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## QtrBel (May 31, 2012)

Two wheeled is easy. Back of truck bed and something to protect shafts and roof. But you can find those with removable shafts - that is my preference. Same for the wagonettes and many are made to switch between shafts or pole. We had a slant load with a gate midway (straight across) and vehicles were loaded and locked down in back. Often though we hauled 4 - 6 and a much larger vehicle on another trailer.


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## horselovinguy (Oct 1, 2013)

For those of you who do this now....

I'm thinking *16' floor space* is what would accommodate a horse and cart?
So, possibly not a 16' trailer as that also includes the tongue and hitch section outside, up front...but don't know what "size" that then would be. :|

Now, if Thunder is small, pony sized,... you of course don't need as big, but if this then is the only trailer...:icon_rolleyes:
You I think know where my mind is headed... :frown_color:
Enabler here for having multiple trailers. 

:runninghorse2:...


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## ducky1234 (May 2, 2017)

horselovinguy said:


> For those of you who do this now....
> Enabler here for having multiple trailers.


Ah... Multiple headaches. I only have two dull throbs....


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## Kaifyre (Jun 16, 2016)

@horselovinguy In the beginning I probably won't be driving too often by myself so needing a second person all the time to assist isn't a huge deal breaker for me ... although I hear you, it is better to be self sufficient (what if my helper gets injured or ill on the drive and I need someone to help me put it back up at the end of the day?) so I will look into that. Also, yes, I'm not a big fan of having to unhitch my trailer to get it out. Those are both great points, I'll have to think on that some more. I have thought up a bunch of ways to secure the vehicle inside the trailer, but I hadn't thought of installing a harness hook inside to help me transport the harness - thank you! I would probably put it in a waterproof bag of some sort for transport ... when I'm not using it, the harness will be stored in my other trailer with a tack room, but I am looking into putting a storage box inside the horse portion of the trailer so it wouldn't take up so much room inside the tack room. I'd probably use those atv ramps to load it, as I'd want as inexpensive of a "secondary" trailer as I could find, and ramps on the trailer itself are expensive! If I'm going to be trading in my 2 horse trailer though, I would want a permanent ramp on it. 
@ducky1234 That's a really good idea! If you don't mind me asking, what did you end up spending on a winch? I'm assuming you don't need anything super heavy duty to get a 250 pound cart into the truck bed? What is yours rated for?

Lol horselovinguy, I'm not opposed to having multiple trailers .... that just means I'll have the ability to transport more horses ... hmmm .... ; ) lol Kidding, I'll never have that many horses as I like to ride/work each horse daily and there's only so many hours in the day for me to work with them ... that means like 3 tops. As a general rule I LOATHE stock trailers. Most of them don't have tack rooms, unless you want to buy a nice fancy one, and they're open on the sides which I don't like, so the animals are getting wet/too much wind/hail/whatever you're driving through. I have thought about getting a 2+1 trailer and putting the vehicle in the box in front. I found some REALLY nice trailers last night that would fit my needs, and then I could *sniff* trade in my lovely little 2 horse straight. Something like this:

https://horsetrailerworld.com/home/trailerdetail.asp?ID=1187747

-- Kai


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## horselovinguy (Oct 1, 2013)

Suddenly there are a lot of manufacturers offering the "2 + 1" configuration....
I think people and what they want are being listened to,_ finally._
Look around and do some serious price shopping.
The latest one I see advertised by me is D&D brand...:shrug:
_I know nothing about them and am *not* endorsing them..._
_Just a ad I've seen....:|

Happy shopping and good luck in your search.
:runninghorse2:_*....
*_jmo..._


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## ducky1234 (May 2, 2017)

Kaifyre said:


> @ducky1234 That's a really good idea! If you don't mind me asking, what did you end up spending on a winch? I'm assuming you don't need anything super heavy duty to get a 250 pound cart into the truck bed? What is yours rated for?


Let me see if I can take a pic and post it later tomorrow. I bought the winch was some years back. It's not heavy duty and it wasn't expensive. It was easy install after I drilled the holes in the truck. It made one person loading possible regardless of upper body strength.


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## Kaifyre (Jun 16, 2016)

Does anyone on this forum have/use a 2 + 1 configuration trailer? What do other people use them for? I would think it would be very useful for the driving crowd ... although I was looking at a floor plan on Featherlite's website about one of their 2 + 1 models and their side ramp was only 54". The cart I was looking at is 58" wide so I would need either an extra wide ramp, or a company that makes the center divider moveable/collapsible. I haven't looked at any other floorplans yet for a 2 + 1 trailer but I imagine they're all fairly similar. 

-- Kai


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## ducky1234 (May 2, 2017)

Here's how I have it set up for one person cart loading into a pickup bed:


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## QtrBel (May 31, 2012)

I've never seen a 4 person wagonette small enough for the bed of a pickup. Most are closing in on 9 foot. Some of the 4 person marathons are 7 1/2 foot. It's been awhile since I've hailed one. Shafts/pole assemblies are removable and fit under the wagon. We traveled with a custom trailer we (not so) affectionately called the white whale. It was made to accommodate the side entry 15 person surrey without removing the top of the surrey. It was in front of the horses so it could be winched in by the winch attached to the front wall of the horse portion and we loaded 4 horses behind it. Two pair, straight load. We could remove the wench and load two more pair. That was not something I looked forward to driving but there was a tack section between the horses and living quarters that we could load 8 sets of harness or a combination of harness and show gear. We never worked with less than two so usually the conveyance traveled by flatbed with one person and the horses in the smaller slant load.

2+1 look interesting but you would be limited by the width of the trailer.


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## Kaifyre (Jun 16, 2016)

@ducky1234 Thanks, that's a nice little setup! When you pull it in wheels first, how much if any of the cart shafts stick out of the bed in the back? Or does the whole kit 'n caboodle fit in there? My fiancé's truck has a regular 6.5 foot bed, I'm guessing draft shafts would stick out at least a little? Thanks for sharing, the video made it super easy to understand. : )

@QtrBel Holy cow now THAT'S a trailer!! Good gravy I can't even imagine pulling all that ... whoo. And I thought *A* draft horse and *A* carriage/cart was a pain! I thought about trailer width as well ... and the width of the side ramp, unless they have models where the stalls break down easily so I could load the carriage/cart from the rear, then put the stalls together and load the horse(s). I was thinking either removable shafts or angling it so the shafts run diagonally from bottom to top and that would allow it a bit of extra room ... but one would have to measure to be sure. I think for now, the 2 wheeled carriage in the truck bed is going to be the best I can do, unless I want to trade my nice trailer in for a beater or a stock trailer - and if I'm going to trade this one in, I want to trade it in for something decent, so I'm hoping to wait a little bit. 

I've decided to get a 2 wheeled cart at first, for a number of reasons - I'm not planning on having that many passengers at the moment since Thunder will still be learning all this until next year in all likelihood, and my fiancé and I are moving this summer so I'd rather not spend the money if I can avoid it, and I simply don't have a trailer that can transport a 4 wheeled carriage right now. So yeah ... I'll just get him going and next year when everything is more settled and I'm reasonably certain he's not going to cause a wreck somewhere I can sell this cart and move up to the wagonette that I wanted to begin with. At that point his growth will have slowed so I'll feel more comfortable getting him a collar harness (sorry guys, but I just wasn't keen on borrowing one from the breeder since we're moving, or buying one and padding, and potentially having to go through multiple collars, so I got him a breastcollar type). 

So here's the cart I'm interested in (today at least, it changes from day to day lol ... but this is one I keep coming back to so it's likely going to be the one I buy): https://freycarriageshop.com/collec...bel-draft-horse-size-cart?variant=21762662721

I also like this one: https://freycarriageshop.com/collec...rse-size-sprint-cart-from?variant=33682259841 But for that price I can darn near buy a wagonette, so I almost certainly won't be buying that one. I like all the custom options though. : }

I love the Frey's Switchback wagonette ( https://freycarriageshop.com/collections/switchback ) but they don't have a price listed for it which probably means I can't afford it lol, so this is the wagonette I was looking at purchasing when we're ready to move from 2 wheels to 4:

Frontier Marathon XL Wagonette DRAFT HORSE | Frontier Equestrian|Draft Horse Saddle|Horse Harness|Jasper MO

I realize that I could probably save a bunch of money by buying a used vehicle, and I have been scouring the local Craiglist and other ads looking for a decent used one. I might end up buying used ... but I don't know why, perhaps because I feel that something out of the box that has therefore never been in an accident is safer, or because I know it hasn't been sitting rusting in some pasture for the last three years, or whatever ... but buying used kind of makes me nervous. I'd be much more confident in a new harness and new carriage I think, than a used one of either. It might be all in my head ... it probably is ... but most likely I'll be buying a new vehicle, even if it costs a bit more. Idk, what are your thoughts? Would it be easy to tell if the thing has been in an accident or is not welded properly or something? 

-- Kai


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## ducky1234 (May 2, 2017)

Kaifyre said:


> When you pull it in wheels first, how much if any of the cart shafts stick out of the bed in the back? Or does the whole kit 'n caboodle fit in there?


Mine fits with the shafts resting on the bed door. So I wrap the shafts with some towels around the shafts and lay them on the bed door. As long as the shaft overhang doesn't interfere with the trailer on turns, you'll be alright. I tie the wheels to the truck bed walls.

You are looking at some nice carts. Rubber wheels are the absolute best choice for comfort, traction, maintenance, and everything you want except for looks. Tough to beat the old fashion wagon wheel for looks.


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## QtrBel (May 31, 2012)

The meadowbrook we used for show (draft size) was over 11 foot end to shaft tip.


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## QtrBel (May 31, 2012)

Sure I missed the edit window. Everything you are looking at has removable shafts. All you need to worry about is length of the vehicle minus the shaft. Makes moving a lot easier. Harness and carriages both you can find really good deals on used. I'd say it is easier to buy used cart as you can see damage and rust. Harness if you were looking for something standard then you just want to look at it for wear and overall condition. But for the price you can get new and if you get into showing or something like parades where you want fancy then used is a much better deal and makes more sense. We always had 8 foot beds on the trucks so we had a longer length than a standard (6'5") or short (5'8") bed if we hauled in the bed.


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