trailers for slingshot

    Anyone have experience with pulling a trailer with SS? Am looking at popup tent trailers and need to know peoples' experiences... problems, likes, dislikes, regrets, "if I had only known's," best features, worst features, etc. Want to make a decision quickly. am thinking the bushtec hitch and fender look best. but might have my own hitch made by friend... THANKS for the help.

    Quote from mugshot

    Anyone have experience with pulling a trailer with SS? Am looking at popup tent trailers and need to know peoples' experiences... problems, likes, dislikes, regrets, "if I had only known's," best features, worst features, etc. Want to make a decision quickly. am thinking the bushtec hitch and fender look best. but might have my own hitch made by friend... THANKS for the help.

    what did you want to know? I've been hauling my Bushtec trailer around all over the place using @'RichArlt''s hitch. Thing is solid. @'Noel Hughes' has even hauled another SS with one of these hitches.

    I'm willing to work with you on a hitch system (I have a couple of Beta Test Units available also). Thanks to the help of our beta testers like @'jorgebri60, we think we have it perfected now and are hoping to do a product launch this month through @'Noel Hughes at Cycle Springs. Attached is a "Top Secret" sneak peak of the Wycked Hitch!


    Wycked Tow Hitch W Clevis.PDF

    Hey, Richarlt,


    can you tell me why you opted not to have the lower arms on your hitch, similar to the one Bushtec sells? And what does your top arm attach to??? It seems like there would be a lot of sway pressure from side to side with such a long, curving arm, especially on curves...? You obviously did this for a reason. I am curious. Thanks.

    @mugshot. When I shot that video, I didn't have I chance to load it up so I'm basically pulling an empty trailer. I've promised @RichArlt I'd post a video of someone following me while it's fully loaded and traveling down different roads. I'll see about getting to that this weekend since everything still attached from my trip to colorado this a week ago.
    More to follow.

    Thanks Wolf. That shows me a lot. But one of the inevitable problems with mods is that they are often incompatible (unavoidably) with other mods.
    In my case, I have my amplifier installed at the rear tip of the tail, where it is solid and waterproof. But that's where the hitch goes. I also have installed a roll bar that completely replaces the two black hoops behind the seats. So I have all kinds of things in the way of a Wycked install. But the hitch looks solid and rugged, for sure. Thanks for the video. And good work, RichArlt!

    thanks, Jorge! I'll look forward to that Colo trip. That's exactly where we want to go with our Bushtec camper trailer. It's a bit larger and heavier than yours. But I fear I will still have issues with the install, given our mods that are already installed in about the only places we could put them (besides the amplifier and fabricated rollbar, we also have a re-routed gas filler line and a re-located license plate, light, and camera that fit right where the hitch looks to come out of the lower back end..? dangit.

    I have full detail pictures of the install and where it mounts and such. while it does take up quite a bit of the front portion of the rear deck where it attaches to the frame the rear is pretty clear. There's plenty of space on the right side of the rear deck. The left is pretty much taken up by the fuel tank (as you're probably already aware). Let me gather all that stuff up and see if you might be able to do something. Nothing against Bushtec (obviously, I own one of their trailers), but that SS hitch of theirs is just plain uglier than sin. This hitch also allows me to attach a smaller cargo carrier to carry a couple small bags and an ice chest if i don't really want to pull the trailer. :thumbup:

    Quote from mugshot

    Hey, Richarlt,


    can you tell me why you opted not to have the lower arms on your hitch, similar to the one Bushtec sells? And what does your top arm attach to??? It seems like there would be a lot of sway pressure from side to side with such a long, curving arm, especially on curves...? You obviously did this for a reason. I am curious. Thanks.

    I'll let the cat out of the bag, the engineers at Polaris made that fin in the rear deck to house our hitch system......J/K (but people have wondered?).


    Our 1/4" plate, carbon steel center piece mounts to the front piece of the 1-1/2" steel frame tubing of the SS. The two 1/4" plate side frame rails mount to the 1-1/2" steel tubing frame at the seat belt mounts. So we are pulling from the beefed up tubular steel tub that the roll bars and seat belts are mounted to.....very solid!


    We looked at all kinds of crazy options. We wanted a frame mounted hitch for extra capacity and rigidity that would house a 2" receiver to allow for various accessories making it multi purpose. Making it adjustable and non-obtrusive with the ball removed was another big factor in the design. We also didn't want to have our hitch supports covering up the rear wheel and disrupting the look of the SS. We learned that the rear aluminum subframe had issues with stress fractures (rumored to have come from overloading the Corbins???), so we definitely didn't want to touch that. We also did not want to touch the roll bars. So we finally settled on the adjustable frame with the truss rod adjustment.


    My personal preference is to put a gooseneck on my jet ski trailer and pull from up high (1200 lbs). There is no side sway when you hook up on top of the wheel (I have a video on youtube showing how stout this set-up is). Due to popular demand, we came up with the diamond drop hitch for lighter motorcycle type trailers (up to 550 lbs towing). We do get some side sway with the drop hitch set-up at low speed maneuvering with heavy tongue weights. We have not noticed side sway when pulling down roads and highways with it (Noel Hughes at Cycle Springs has a video up showing him pulling another SS on an SS trailer which has to weigh at least 2400lbs). I can say with confidence that if you are pulling under 550 lbs with the drop hitch, side sway will be minimal and will not affect handling any more that if you were pulling with any other hitch.


    I'm willing to let you test one of our newer beta units out at dealer cost if you are interested, no strings attached.

    That's awesome. I'll share this with my engineer who will be doing the install. I have to make sure all of our mods don't get in the way of your hitch assembly! I appreciate the abundant detail you provided in your answer. you can email me directly with details of the beta install. I don't know if this forum lets us speak directly, so my email address is psutton@mail.sdsu.edu, where I would like to learn your dealer cost that I would pay, as well as shipping, etc. Meanwhile, I'll have my engineer look at the pix and video I have--to see if there are any glaring issues that we can't get around with our extensive mods. Glad you tied it all to the frame and not the weaker subframe. That was one of the issues he was concerned about when I asked him about designing something for me--ie, where to attach it!? the Bushtec goes up and under the back tail (presumably to the frame), but we have changed the gas cap (extended it out like on a car), so that might mess things up, as well--for both you and Bushtec. You, know, if you have good pics (Bushtecs aren't so good) of where your stuff attaches, I can know if we have a shot with yours or not without going through all the hassles of actually installing it. And, of course, your price...Thanks, buddy. I look forward to working with you and with your having great success with this. You've done your homework!