Abundance trailer: a vehicle for fruit delivery

Abundance is an idea that solves two problems at once: the poor quality of many people's diets, especially the disadvantaged in society, and the common sight of good fruit going to waste, left to rot in busy urban areas. Abundance is also the nickname given to a trailer built for the Abundance project for transporting fruit, and used for inspiration by Engineers Without Borders Sheffield. This short aricle shows the Abundance trailer in action, provides some information on its design and build, and links to additional resources, including a CAD file of the finished product.

The Abundance trailer in action

The trailer is sturdy due to its width, light when not follow loaded and stiff. It handles nicely. Below are some photos of the machine in action.

Although the trailer was designed to carry fruit, the above photo shows it is hand as a general-purpose load carrying machine.

The photo above shows the trailer used for the purpose it was designed: carrying fruit. The lack of side panels or roof make the crates extremely easy to access. In fact, the dimensions of the trailer revolve around the standard fruit crate.

Making the trailer

The following set of photos demonstrate the build process of the Abundance trailer in action, taken from Flickr. (Press the backward, left <- arrow to see the images in the correct order.)

The trailer design

The trailer is constructed from L-section metal. In this case aluminium is used, but steel would be equally effective, if a little heavier. Most of the dimensions can be seen from the following images below, and the associated pdf documents, created by EWB Pedal Sheffield's Powered Machines group (PPM).

These dimensions are available in a pdf file.

The image above shows the hitch, a 'triple C' design, popular in DIY trailers. The problem with this design is the thinness (1 mm) of the stainless, which bends easily. Thicker steel has been used by the PPM group since.

The final image is best viewed as a pdf. This file is a Bill of Materials and a beautiful CAD image in one.

If you want to get really high-tech, group created a CAD model of the trailer using SolidWorks. The files associated with this CAD diagram can be downloaded from here.

Materials

So where did we get all the materials from? The Abundance trailer was in fact only one of several trailers we built for the project. A full Bill of Materials, including links to suppliers close to Sheffield, UK, can be seen here.