A 4X4 Harbor Freight trailer is a useful tool to have on your property.
Attach a trailer jack to it and it’s small enough that you can move it
around by hand, something like a wheelbarrow. Attaching it to a lawn or
garden tractor can be a great way to move leaves, branches and
woodchips and even small amounts of sand and gravel around your
property.
Here is a wood chipper tied to the front of the trailer. The chips go into the trailer where they can be transported to various locations on my property for mulching and ground insulation. Tilting the trailer back makes it easy to unload the chips.
A trailer jack can be purchased for $35 at Harbor Freight. There isn’t much room to allow the jack to turn out of the way, so I removed the swivel mechanism and mounted the jack directly to the tow arm with U-bolts. I'll just crank the wheel high to get it out of the way when the trailer is attached for towing. I can always remove the wheel if I am taking the trailer over rough terrain and I am worried the wheel may touch ground. So far I haven't had to do that. The wheel is shown retracted in the following photos.
But why not also use an electronic linear actuator jack from Amazon for $39 to make a dump trailer? Tilting the trailer bed makes removing whatever is on the bed so much easier. And a DPDT switch on your tractor allows you to raise and lower the trailer without getting off of the tractor. The wire is shown above passing through a hole under the tractor seat. I used a quick disconnect connector so that the trailer can be easily removed. With this system, the bed can be raised to about 15 degrees, and it can be done without getting off the tractor.
The flat bed shown here is made out of 2X6s and plywood. The bed is attached to the 4X4 trailer by two heavy duty hinges (Harbor Freight, $6 each) so that the entire bed can be tilted back.
The trailer is going to need sides for moving leaves, branches and woodchips around. This picture shows how trailer sides can be made out of 4 pieces of plywood attached by 6 hinges. The sides can be folded up for storage when they aren’t needed. Only 3 bolts are needed to attach the sides to the trailer, two at the back of the trailer and one near the front. (Ignore the winch in this picture. I removed it and mounted it on the trailer arm as described above.)
Here are the trailer sides folded up for storage.
Note there are many ways to build something. This trailer evolved over time, and has endured many modifications. This final version works for me and hopefully will help the do-it-yourselfer create an even better design.