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Picking up a Chinook - will it fit on a trailer?


kevinm

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New here, but am getting ready to pick up a non running Chinook - it's about three hours away. Will it fit on a regular flatbed trailer, 6 feet wide or so? Or if anyone else has ideas on the best way to get it home - tow bar and flat tow, tow dolly, etc.

It's way too far to have a big flatbed tow truck transport it - I'll need to do this myself. Any help would be great!

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If its manual which most of them are a tow bar will work fine. Just pop it into neutral. Tires have to be decent though. If it's a rare automatic your going to need the trailer. 6ft wide is plenty. Wheelbase is standard long bed for that year. If the wheels fit, it fits. Axle width is 55 or 56 inches. Tons of room to spare

Linda S

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2 minutes ago, linda s said:

If its manual which most of them are a tow bar will work fine. Just pop it into neutral. Tires have to be decent though. If it's a rare automatic your going to need the trailer. 6ft wide is plenty. Wheelbase is standard long bed for that year. If the wheels fit, it fits. Axle width is 55 or 56 inches. Tons of room to spare

Linda S

Thanks for the info! I'll probably just go with the tow bar setup (I'll have to figure out how to mount the connectors to the bumper, I guess) - we were going to go with a trailer, but was concerned about the width of the camper body and if it would clear the fenders on an equipment trailer.

 

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Throw a tie down strap OVER THE TOP of the camper too. Trust me on this one. The interior straps holding the pop-top down may appear in great condition but they can fail easily, the metal bites can fail, the screws holding the straps can be rusted and fail, the material the screws are in could be corroded and lead to failure. If the pop-top parachutes on the freeway its a painful problem.

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most car trls are 102 wide but doesn't mean yours is

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  • 2 weeks later...

For anyone looking to pick up a non running Chinook, it does indeed fit on a regular U-Haul car trailer. Pulled this one over three hours with no problems at all - we did bring along and use some long ratchet straps to cinch the top down, which was a good suggestion from kevinchinook. The inside straps were pretty much gone.

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Glad you got it home safe and you took my suggestion with the straps. I was lucky mine popped up at relatively low speed and didn't damage too much. I'd heard stories of others being completely ripped off. I eventually installed exterior rubber trailer latches to secure the pop-top. Got the kind that had 4 screw holes in each mount and used silkaflex in the screw holes. 2 latches in front and 2 in back. Really secure now.

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3 hours ago, kevinchinook said:

Glad you got it home safe and you took my suggestion with the straps. I was lucky mine popped up at relatively low speed and didn't damage too much. I'd heard stories of others being completely ripped off. I eventually installed exterior rubber trailer latches to secure the pop-top. Got the kind that had 4 screw holes in each mount and used silkaflex in the screw holes. 2 latches in front and 2 in back. Really secure now.

Thanks again for the tip!

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