Looking for some advice on how to load an RT into a Newmar Canyon Star Toy Hauler

[Spiderwoman]

Looking for some advice on how to load a Can-Am RT Spyder into the back of a 2014 Canyon Star. Looks like the bike will fit once we take the Trailer Hitch off the Spyder. Need some advice on loading the bike.

The ground clearance is minimal on the RT and concerned about trying to load with the Tailgate design on the Canyon Star.

Has anyone had good success by backing the bike into the Toy Hauler? Looks like that might be the best approach but hoping someone has worked out the load issues with the low clearance on the bike.

Any suggestions?

[Peter Aawen]

Just a word of warning (or maybe two??)

Any ground clearance issues you may have going forwards on a Spyder are generally made WORSE by going backwards!! At least going forwards you can more easily see & maybe avoid hanging up the low hanging bits, but there are low hanging bits under your Spyder that are LOWER and 'grabbier' at the back than the front - check out this thread:

https://www.spyderlovers.com/forums/...0-Bottomed-out

- that's just one, I know, but it's not all that unique, there are more!

Aaand, if you've ever had traction issues while trying to get your Spyder up a ramp going forwards, bear in mind that those issues are generally MUCH WORSE when you're in reverse & the rear tire/drive tire is trying to PULL the Spyder up rather than PUSH it up! BlueKnight911 made a perforated metal ramp that helped with that somewhat, and there are other alternatives you can buy, but because of some of those bothersome things we can't avoid like gravity & physics & weight transfer et al, it's generally somewhat harder to REVERSE a Spyder up anything than it is to Drive it up FORWARDS!

Just Sayin'....

Over to you, & Good Luck!

[Ready2Retire]

This may be apples to oranges as I don't know how steep the ramp is on your Newmar. I recently loaded my Spyder in our Grand Design Momentum 381M toy hauler. The 381 was hooked to the truck when I loaded it, but if the break-over angle was not going to work, I could unhook and raise the front of the 5'er using the front legs and reduce the steepness. Your Newmar probably has front leveling legs (hydraulic?) that you might be able to use to change the ramp angle. I had sufficient clearance and didn't bottom out...

20200517_150548_resized.jpg

John

[Steve W.]

And, whatever method you use, ...
MAKE SURE YOUR RAMPS ARE ANCHORED TO THE TRAILER.

You don't want to re-enact any of these:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qSFolrjBZRQ

.

[cptjam]

Put a couple of 2x6” boards that are 24-30 inches long under the ramp. Flattens out the angle. Go in forward, and use the lightest person to load. If you have to, walk beside the bike, keeping your weight off of it. We load and unload all the time into trailers, conexes, toyhaulers. The front leveling jacks can help, too. Some folks use a winch to pull it onboard, but I have not. I have seen it done. Worked great! No drama, no wheel spin, no roaring engine. Just a Quiet loading.

[BLUEKNIGHT911]

I had a similar issue with loading my RT into my Toyt. pk-up that I had made into a flatbed after removing the OEM bed .... go to my albums and see what I was faced with ..... the biggest challenge was TRACTION ... I solved it by adding a home made " cheese grater " ... that's what I call it ... I used a thin ( 24ga. ) 8in. wide piece of galvanized sheet metal that I had punctured with a 3in. nail a couple of hundred times .... I screwed onto my middle ramp ( for the rear tire ) that ramp is 10ft long and climbs up 30 inches , so it's quite steep .... I have loaded in the pouring rain and never lost traction .... if you are good at math & angles you can find out beforehand if the middle of the Spyder will bottom on the upper lip ..... have some 2 x 6's ready at the top ( with edges trimmed so the tire will climb them ) by raising the front tires it will change the angle if you need it .... good luck ..... your side to side clearance will probably not be an issue, mine was ( I had 1.5 inches clearance ) ... so I had 2"x2" guides screwed down to keep the front tires absolutely straight ( like at a car wash ) ..... Mike

[trikermutha]

See you got all kinds of ideas now to load your Spyder

[Spiderwoman]

Great input from all. Thanks for the help and will pass along to my load guy!

[Outporter]

Here,s how I load my Spyder into my toy hauler. I built a couple of ramps/blocks approx, 4' -5' long, 4"-6" high (basically an elongated semi-circle, I stacked 2x6 on top of each other each one centered on the other and 12" shorted - 6" each end.) I place the ramps/blocks on the floor of the rear of the garage and run the bike up the toy hauler ramp, up over my ramp/block across and down the other side. Just make sure the blocks are short enough to come completely down the front side. Works like a charm for both RT an F3. You can use thinner material to give a more gradual rise/fall, just need more of them.

[triplethreat]

I have a Grand Design 394M Toy Hauler and I wanted to be able to load the RTL without having to unhook the trailer from the truck in order to load or unload. This may be a bit more work than you want to do, but this is how I do mine.

I have two low profile plastic ramps (10,000 lbs rated for the pair) and a 3' long wooden board ramp that I use. The key for me was to be able to raise the ramp door off of the ground about 6 or 7 inches, then put the ramps up to the edge/end of the ramp door. In order to elevate the ramp door, even if you are on uneven ground, I chose to buy these Stromberg Carlson step supports and I place one under each rubber bumper that is on the ramp door. The step supports are adjustable in height from about 4 1/2" up to a little over 7" and they work great, especially if the ramp doesn't come down and touch at all three rubber bumpers because the ground is not level. So I put the ramp door on the step supports and then the ramps up against the end of the ramp door. I also have a couple of pieces of wood that are cut to fit in the Pad area or the plastic ramps. This is the area where the tires would be resting if you were using them for a ramp while working under the car or whatever. Here is a couple of pics of that.....



Ready to load into the trailer....


Pic of the Stromberg Carlson Step Support....


Landed.....and bicycles on both sides of the Spyder....


Tied down and ready to roll. I have BOTH front wheels/tires tied down to the E Track and the Spyder gets the Parking brake set after everything is strapped securely down. The two front wheels/tires are my only tie off point and it does the job and is very secure....


One other thing I've added, that isn't shown in the pictures are a set of fairly heavy eye bolts into the side of the center ramp. I use some small size rope ratchets to attach to the eye bolts, then to the ramp gate so that the board doesn't "kick out" when driving up the ramp. The other two ramps (the plastic ones) really don't need to be attached as they are used for the front wheels and of course the front wheels just roll up....they are not powered like the rear wheel.

[Ready2Retire]

Hi triplethreat. I actually thought about stealing your pics from the other site and posting them here as another idea (giving you credit of course!). Glad you chimed in...

John

[MONK]

You know, if you get a good running start and goose the throttle just before you hit the ramps, angle won't really matter. Just sayin'.

[BLUEKNIGHT911]

Hey " triplethreat " good on you .... I love another " you can do this " kind of person ... I liked your pics and thought maybe I could save you some time with doing this ..... Have you ever considered just using the black ramps ( no wood risers ) by pushing it forward about 8-10 inches and go under the Toy hauler RAMP ???? ... Ithink it would accomplish the same effect ...... Mike

[Spiderwoman]

Thanks for the input and I have the "ole man" reading all of these ideas tonight.....

[triplethreat]

You know, if you get a good running start and goose the throttle just before you hit the ramps, angle won't really matter. Just sayin'.

For a guy that is self admittedly not good with tools, you might want to reconsider this approach (approach.....pun intended), cause there are going to be a lot of things to put back together!

[triplethreat]

Hey " triplethreat " good on you .... I love another " you can do this " kind of person ... I liked your pics and thought maybe I could save you some time with doing this ..... Have you ever considered just using the black ramps ( no wood risers ) by pushing it forward about 8-10 inches and go under the Toy hauler RAMP ???? ... Ithink it would accomplish the same effect ...... Mike

Thanks for the kudos....It seems like just about every single project I start, after a brain? storming session, I end up having to make a part or make something out of a piece of ???? that was never intended to be used for that application. My bicycle racks in the Momentum are a classic example. Anyway, the possible problem(s) with your suggestion is that only having the two ramps and not three, would leave one of the rubber bumpers on the ramp gate unsupported...and that's quick way to warp the ramp and cause issue with it. The other possibility is that since the Spyders are so low to the ground, that method might not lift the ramp gate quite high enough. The first day I tried to load the Spyder after finishing this little project, I had my wife watch the ground clearance under it while I slowly moved it up the ramp. She said that there may have been slightly over an inch of clearance between the nose of the Spyder and the ramp....before the wheels finally got to the ramp and increasing the clearance. I might be inclined to try it sometime though, just to see if it is a better solution. Thanks for the suggestion

[triplethreat]

Hi triplethreat. I actually thought about stealing your pics from the other site and posting them here as another idea (giving you credit of course!). Glad you chimed in...

John

You could have done that. The whole idea of forums is to learn and to share what you've personally learned. If it helps someone else out, I'm perfectly OK with that!....in fact, I'm happy to be able to help someone out with an idea that I have had and actually works! Lord knows I've had a lot of help over the years from other forum members on lots of different forums.

[BLUEKNIGHT911]

Thanks for the kudos....It seems like just about every single project I start, after a brain? storming session, I end up having to make a part or make something out of a piece of ???? that was never intended to be used for that application. My bicycle racks in the Momentum are a classic example. Anyway, the possible problem(s) with your suggestion is that only having the two ramps and not three, would leave one of the rubber bumpers on the ramp gate unsupported...and that's quick way to warp the ramp and cause issue with it. The other possibility is that since the Spyders are so low to the ground, that method might not lift the ramp gate quite high enough. The first day I tried to load the Spyder after finishing this little project, I had my wife watch the ground clearance under it while I slowly moved it up the ramp. She said that there may have been slightly over an inch of clearance between the nose of the Spyder and the ramp....before the wheels finally got to the ramp and increasing the clearance. I might be inclined to try it sometime though, just to see if it is a better solution. Thanks for the suggestion

I think my first explanation led you think something that I wasn't saying .... my reference to " ramps " were the two black plastic ones .... NOT the center ramp ..... after 10 + years of Spyder ownership I have figured out you always need Three ramps .....and by sliding the TWO side ramps forward under your Hauler ramp you can forget the extra wood blocks .... I hope this better explains what I was trying to say ...... Mike

[Spiderwoman]

I think my first explanation led you think something that I wasn't saying .... my reference to " ramps " were the two black plastic ones .... NOT the center ramp ..... after 10 + years of Spyder ownership I have figured out you always need Three ramps .....and by sliding the TWO side ramps forward under your Hauler ramp you can forget the extra wood blocks .... I hope this better explains what I was trying to say ...... Mike

[triplethreat]

I think my first explanation led you think something that I wasn't saying .... my reference to " ramps " were the two black plastic ones .... NOT the center ramp ..... after 10 + years of Spyder ownership I have figured out you always need Three ramps .....and by sliding the TWO side ramps forward under your Hauler ramp you can forget the extra wood blocks .... I hope this better explains what I was trying to say ...... Mike

I did pretty much understand what you were saying....but....I still need support in the middle of the T.H. ramp gate. One plastic ramp on each side with no support in the middle of the T.H. ramp gate is asking for trouble....as in warping the ramp. It probably wouldn't happen right away, but over time the T.H. ramp gate would have problems. I just saw a post on one of the Grand Design forums that I'm on, the results of not having the ramp supported at all three rubber bumpers. The corner of the ramp separated about 1 1/2" and warped the entire ramp structural frame.

[BLUEKNIGHT911]

I did pretty much understand what you were saying....but....I still need support in the middle of the T.H. ramp gate. One plastic ramp on each side with no support in the middle of the T.H. ramp gate is asking for trouble....as in warping the ramp. It probably wouldn't happen right away, but over time the T.H. ramp gate would have problems. I just saw a post on one of the Grand Design forums that I'm on, the results of not having the ramp supported at all three rubber bumpers. The corner of the ramp separated about 1 1/2" and warped the entire ramp structural frame.

Your pic shows THREE Jacks ..... I didn't say anything about REMOVING them .... and my idea was to use the plastic ramps as the left and right side support .... leave the Center jack where it is ...... Mike

[Ready2Retire]

Your pic shows THREE Jacks ..... I didn't say anything about REMOVING them .... and my idea was to use the plastic ramps as the left and right side support .... leave the Center jack where it is ...... Mike

The problem with your suggestion is the ramps are a fixed height. If the ground is uneven, Triplethreat would have no way to compensate for the unevenness. With three adjustable jacks, he can set the height of the T.H. ramp where he needs it to be level with the 5'er. Even if that means the plastic ramps are slightly higher or lower than the ramp itself.

John

[BLUEKNIGHT911]

The problem with your suggestion is the ramps are a fixed height. If the ground is uneven, Triplethreat would have no way to compensate for the unevenness. With three adjustable jacks, he can set the height of the T.H. ramp where he needs it to be level with the 5'er. Even if that means the plastic ramps are slightly higher or lower than the ramp itself.

John

John you are absolutely correct ..... He never should have bought the Toy Hauler or the Spyder for that matter ...... Mike

[Ready2Retire]

John you are absolutely correct ..... He never should have bought the Toy Hauler or the Spyder for that matter ...... Mike

MMMkay! Not sure where that came from, but now I understand you perfectly! BLUEKNIGHT911

John

[Tomline]

I have a 2012 RT and a 2019 Forest River Gray Wolf 22RR. My unit seems kinda high and the Spyder has bottomed out a couple of times. The ramp to floor transition of the TH is kind of wide and deep. I use a piece of 1" by 6" to fill it in because that's where it seems to bottom out! Right now my plan is to use a short 2" by 8"by 24" with a taper/angle on one end and see if that will solve my problem. I have to load it backwards because my TH is only wide enough to do it that way. We, the sales guy and I took measurements to make sure it will fit that way. My propane regulator croaked one month after the 12 month guarntee was up.