Heavy Equipment Shipping Guide

Shipping heavy farm equipment often requires more than just calling up a carrier or broker. There is a great deal of preparation and planning that goes into moving a large piece of farm equipment. This guide covers everything from preparing the equipment, special permits, choosing a trailer, and loading the equipment. This guide will help you to avoid common shipping mistakes, ensure your equipment ships trouble free and keep your business running smoothly.

Preparing Your Equipment for Shipping

Hopefully you saved your owners’ manual for your equipment. Most owners’ manuals contain information about how to prepare equipment to be shipped. If it does, you’re in luck. Simply follow the instructions carefully and you will be ready to go. If you don’t have the manual consult the manufacturer or try to find a version of the manual on the Internet. There are also standard procedures that apply to the shipment of most heavy farm equipment.

  • Disconnect the battery.
  • Secure or remove any loose parts on the equipment.
  • Don’t ship with a full tank of gas.
  • Be mindful of fluids in general. Some equipment requires draining hydraulic lines. This is especially true if the equipment will be moved through any adverse weather conditions.

Know Your Equipment – Dimensions and Specs

It’s critical that you know exactly what your equipment weighs, and the dimensions. This is because there are literally hundreds of different types of trucks and moving equipment. Each type of truck works best for moving equipment of a certain size and weight. Your owner’s manual will likely contain this information, but another great resource for this information is Ritchie Specs. The site lists the specifications for thousands of equipment types. Find your equipment in that manual and record the dimensions and weight.

The Right Type of Trailer for Your Equipment

The vast majority of wheeled farm equipment will be shipped on either a step deck (drop deck) with ramps or a removable gooseneck trailer also commonly referred to as a lowboy trailer. Lowboy trailers are very versatile and easy to load because you can drive right onto them. If you have a full size tractor, combine, excavator, or bull dozer your choices are fairly simple. You use a lowboy trailer.

When moving smaller, light-duty tractors or large riding mowers using a lowboy is overkill. In this case, we recommend a step deck (drop deck) trailer with ramps or what is referred to as s hot shot trailer with ramps. These types of trailers are not as readily available as lowboys, but are much more cost effective.

This is where you will need to make a decision about how to ship. If you’re moving light duty equipment there is a trade-off between speed and cost. Lowboy trailers are easy to find, but cost more. A step deck trailer with ramps may take longer to find, but will save you money. You will need to determine the proper trade-off between the need to ship quickly and costs in these situations.

To see an examples of the two types of trucks discussed above, see these pages from XtraLease:

Your carrier or freight broker should know what the proper equipment for your load is when given the weight and dimensions, but it’s a good idea to be informed. Inexperienced carriers can sometimes make mistakes regarding trailer choice for a given load.

A Word On Permits and Large Equipment – If you’re equipment requires a double drop, extendable flatbed or other specialized trailer you may need to obtain a permit to move that equipment. This requirement can vary from state to state. To find out whether or not you will need a permit you need to contact your local transportation department. To see if you will need a permit for your load, see this helpful page from Pilotcars.com. It has a great guide showing each state’s permit requirements. Your transportation provider should also be able to help determine if you will need special permits for your equipment.

Ensuring You Can Lift Your Equipment onto the Truck

Most heavy farm equipment shipments are loaded on to lowboy trailers and in that case you can drive right on to them. Loading in this case is easy. Just make sure you don’t exceed the width requirements. The vast majority of trailers are 102” wide.

If you are loading light duty farm equipment, you may be using a step deck trailer and in that case you will need ramps. Some carriers will have ramps with them, but not always. You may need to have your own ramps ready when the carrier arrives to pick up the equipment. Each type of ramp has a weight rating and some can only handle equipment with a certain wheelbase. Most farm equipment will require heavy duty ramps with a very high weight rating. Even light duty farm equipment can exceed 4,000 lbs and finding ramps with that capacity can be difficult.

Here is a resource for heavy duty ramps that can handle most light duty farm equipment: