Flatbed trailer

Trailer that typically has a flat ‘bed’ as its floor but has no side-walls or roof, enabling it to be used for carrying a wide range of cargo, including bulky, unusual and ‘oversized’ items.

A flatbed trailer, also known as a ‘flat’ trailer or ‘flat platform’ trailer, offers versatility in terms of what it can carry, largely due to the fact that it has no walls or roof. In fact, as it is available as a range of derivatives, it is the most flexible of the trailer types in terms of handling a wide and diverse range of payloads. Flatbeds can carry anything from containers to logs to specialist heavy machinery and other equipment.

Flatbeds can be offered with ‘drop-sides’, supplied with an integral coil well (to carry steel rolls, for example) or even a centre-mounted crane for handling ‘heavy side’ building and construction materials, such as bricks and blocks.

They can also be extendable (also known as ‘trombones’)  in order to accommodate indivisible loads, such as beams, bridge spans, steel girders and other oversized items.

In addition to ‘straight-frame’ types, there are ‘step-frame’ types which are often used to carry light plant and equipment. Step-frames enable the transport of higher loads and their lower bed also reduces the trailer’s centre of gravity, increasing its stability.

Flatbed trailers are manufactured in the UK and Ireland by SDC, Dennison and Montracon.

TIP offers flatbed trailers on a short-term rental or a long term lease basis from all of these leading manufacturers and others.

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