installs - service - repairs

Trailer Service and Repair in Columbus

Parts counter and service bay on site. We service what we sell and what we did not.

Most trailer maintenance decisions are really budget decisions, so this is organized by money. Nearly everything on a trailer is cheap to address early and expensive to address late, and the gap between those two numbers is usually an order of magnitude.

Costs almost nothing, prevents the most

Tire pressure, checked cold against the sidewall rating. Dielectric grease on the connector pins. Moving a stored trailer occasionally so the bearings turn. Confirming that a dump trailer’s battery is genuinely being charged by the tow vehicle.

Four habits, perhaps twenty minutes a year in total, and between them they prevent the majority of what arrives in our bay unplanned.

Cheap now, expensive later

Bearings. Repacking is routine. A seized bearing on I-70 costs a hub, a spindle, a tow, and a day. The warning signs are a faint growl that rises with speed, or one hub warmer than the others after a run.

Brake adjustment. An adjustment is minor work. Scored drums and stripped magnets are not, and the drift is slow enough that most owners compensate at the controller without noticing they are doing it.

Ramp gate springs and latches. Replaced as a pair, cheaply, when they start feeling heavy. Left alone, they take the hinges and eventually the gate with them.

Intermittent lights. A connection repair. Ignored, it becomes a full harness trace, and intermittent almost always means a connection on its way to failing completely.

Genuinely expensive either way

Some things cost what they cost. Axle replacement, deck replacement, a hydraulic cylinder or pump, and frame repair. These are the items where catching them early does not make them cheap - it just means you choose when to spend the money rather than having a job site choose for you.

That is the real argument for scheduled inspection. Not that it makes repairs free, but that it converts emergencies into planned work.

Free: your two 40-point inspections

Every new trailer includes two complimentary 40-point safety inspections, at 12 and 24 months, covering bearings, brakes, wiring, welds, couplers, and tires. They are the best value on this page and the most commonly forgotten. Bring the trailer as you use it and mention anything that has felt different.

Parts

Bearings, seals, hubs, brake assemblies and magnets, couplers, jacks, lamps and lenses, harnesses and connectors, ramp springs, latches, D-rings, straps, and tires. Bring the trailer or a photograph plus the model details and we will find the correct part rather than the nearly correct one.

Booking

Call ahead where you can. Describe the symptom rather than the diagnosis - what the trailer is doing is more useful than what you suspect. Simple work can often be done while you wait.

One of 92 TrailersPlus locations, more than 11,900 trailers across the network, 4.8 from over 10,000 reviews, 25+ years, and roughly 95% of each trailer’s weight sourced in the USA.

What It Costs, By Trailer Type

Enclosed cargo. Brakes and bearings are the scheduled spend. The unscheduled one is structural - floor sections, wall panels, roof seams, door seals - and it is always cheaper before water has been getting in for a season.

Dump. Battery and charge line are cheap. Cylinders and pump are not. The 10-gauge floor and walls are the part that should outlast everything, so trouble there means something unusual happened. High-profile sides available if the loads have grown.

Utility and equipment. Deck boards and gate hardware are consumables and priced accordingly. Axles and frame are not, which is the whole argument for having them inspected rather than discovered. High sides and mesh siding fitted on request.

Tilt. Cylinder service is routine. A failed cylinder is not.

Car haulers and powersports. Axles, radial tires, ramps and the commercial doors on enclosed models - all of it operated under load every single use, which is why these are the parts that come back.

Hitches, Wiring and Controllers

Hitch fitting, tow wiring and controller setup. Bring the truck and the trailer together. Getting the controller matched properly costs nothing extra at the time of fitting and is expensive to ignore.

What Each Job Costs In Downtime

Money is one axis; the other is how long the trailer is off the road. For anyone running a delivery or logistics operation, the second one usually matters more.

Same visit, often while you wait. Brake adjustment. Lamp and lens replacement. Connector repair. Tire swap. Jack replacement. Gate spring and latch work. If you call ahead and describe the symptom, most of these are done in an afternoon.

A day. Bearing repack across all hubs. Brake shoe and magnet replacement. Harness trace and rewire. Deck board replacement on an open trailer.

Longer, and worth planning around. Axle replacement. Hydraulic cylinder or pump work. Structural repair to floors, walls or roof seams. Frame work. These are the ones where catching them at an inspection lets you choose the week rather than having a job site choose it for you.

Parts and Accessories

Running gear: bearings, races, seals, hubs, spindles, brake assemblies, magnets, drums, springs. Electrical: harnesses, connectors, plugs, LED lamps and lenses, ground straps, breakaway switches, brake controllers. Hardware: ramp springs, latches, hinges, cables, D-rings, stake pockets, jacks, couplers.

Accessories: tongue boxes, spare tire carriers, security locks, dump tarp kits, E-track and tie-down systems, high sides, mesh siding, and 24-inch side extensions for loads that fill a deck before they reach a rating.

We hold parts for Interstate and Carry-On builds, and we will fit anything you buy here. Bring the trailer or a photograph plus the model details and we will find the correct part rather than the nearly correct one.

The Cheapest Money You Can Spend Here

Two things, and neither is a repair.

The two complimentary 40-point inspections. They cost nothing and they are the most commonly forgotten item on this page. Their real value is not the inspection itself but the conversion of unplanned failures into planned work. For anyone running a delivery or logistics operation on a schedule, that is the whole argument - the repair costs what it costs either way, but you choose the week.

A phone call describing the symptom. Free, and it routinely saves a diagnostic charge. Tell us what the trailer is doing rather than what you think is wrong, and there is a decent chance we can tell you whether it needs the bay at all. A trailer that pulls under braking, growls at speed, or will not lift is often a five-minute answer.

Fleet and Multi-Trailer Owners

Central Ohio is a distribution market and a fair number of the trailers we service come in threes and fours rather than singly. If that is you, a few things change.

Stagger the inspections rather than bringing everything in the same week - it keeps the fleet working and it spreads the spend. Standardise on one coupler height and one connector type across the fleet if you can, because mixed hardware is where drivers make mistakes. Keep a single spare wheel and tire assembly per size rather than per trailer. And track bearing repacks by trailer rather than by date, because in a fleet the mileage diverges fast.

We can set up a schedule that fits around your operating week rather than ours, and we work on trailers we did not sell, whatever the make.

Booking and What To Bring

Call ahead where you can. Bring the trailer as you use it - loaded is more useful than empty if the complaint only shows up under load - and bring the tow vehicle if the problem involves braking, wiring or how the rig feels on the road. Half of what gets reported as a trailer fault is a controller setting or a connector at the truck end.

If you know the model and year, say so. Axle and brake components vary between model years and getting that right up front is the difference between one visit and two.