1965 Hardee 35 Ton Drop Deck Trailer

Purchased: January 15, 2011

I stumbled across this trailer when I was looking for a shorter dry goods trailer on CraigsList. I have a 45 foot trailer with tandem axles at the moment but since I am trying to downsize to a smaller single axle daycab Dodge truck I was looking for a 32 foot single axle trailer to go with it. Anyhow, when I came across this drop deck trailer it made no mention of when it was built. What caught my eye was that it was cheap and therefore within my price range. It was about 100 miles north of my current location (MacDill AFB in Tampa, FL) in a town called Hernando. When I got out to where it was I was surprised to see that it was in better shape then I thought it would be for the price. And when I found out it was from 1965 I knew I had to buy it. While it isn't a dry goods trailer I figured if the Air Force were to move us again I could strap a 20 foot Conex container to it to do a DITY move with.

My overall plans for it are to clean it up and repaint it in Strata Blue to make it look like one of the drop deck trailers I've seen used by the Air Force to move pallets across bases all over the U.S.

Click on any thumbnail for a larger image

The guy I bought the trailer from also had a Detroit Diesel 6-71T with a Roadranger transmission for sale. Came out of the 1983 International he used to haul the trailer around with. Would have bought the engine but don't have enough money left after buying the trailer to even think about buying the engine.

Some interesting sites I saw along the way

When I drove out to see the trailer I took I-275 north to I-75 north and exited at Exit 314. Going this way I had to drive through Floral City and Inverness in order to get to Hernando. Along the way I came across a cool looking Mack B61 tow truck in front of a wrecker company and a junk yard with all sorts of stuff. I had a few minutes to check it out and only went about 150 feet in to the property. Saw several old trucks in the process. I think the GMC was a 620 (that or a 920). Also saw a couple of White's and a nice looking Kenworth. Don't know what year the trucks were but here's a few pics of what little I did see. There was a lot more further back so who knows what else is back there. When I go back up to get the trailer I hope to spend more time checking out the rest of the place.

Just before I got to Exit 314 on my way to check out the trailer I noticed a semi truck broken down in the left lane on the southbound side of I-75 near mile mark 312. Traffic was backed up way past exit 314. So when I was done looking at the trailer instead of heading back to the interstate and in to the traffic jam I took the country road south out of Floral City towards Brooksville. On the way I came across this neat little military surplus store.