Flatbed Securement Discussion 2022

2sides, in your photo, I can’t see how you could get the straps to touch the sides of your load. I’m not a flatbed driver but follow flatbed threads. I’ll be interested if anyone comments on this.

2sides, in your photo, I can’t see how you could get the straps to touch the sides of your load. I’m not a flatbed driver but follow flatbed threads. I’ll be interested if anyone comments on this.

NO professionals here, but .. Tom got home early, and I asked him to chime in; "Why no 'Belly Wraps'?"

This was NEVER his forte' ... just an off season gig from tanks.

I'm waiting for the professionals, as well.

Best wishes, Two Sides ! Gawsh I know you are trying...... Just KUDOS on you for asking and ALWAYS sharing, here on TT.

Good Q, BK !

~ Anne & Tom ~

I can kind of guess at what belly wraps are, but somebody give a definition please.

It looks like overkill to me, but there is nothing wrong with that. You are securing bundled materials. The bindings hold the bundle together. Therefore your straps don't need to touch the sides.

Belly wraps secure the lower bundles on a multi-tiered load of bundled material. The rule is after two tiers you need a strap on those lower bundles. This load only has two tiers. Twosides got it covered. There is no need for belly straps on this one.

Thanks for posting this Chief. I'm running into some problems as I tarp with not being consistent. Some loads I tarp look ok and some have giant air bubbles in them.

I even made a Rap song for this load.

I . . . .

Like big boards, and I cannot lie,

All my brothers cast a jealous eye,

I tarp my wood in just an hour,

And down the road I fly.

I am cracking up Ok Sir tarps-alot. I see you lol.

If only I could tarp a load in an hour... I switched up techniques with this load I'm on now and ran into a little issue. I always "fold" the side up and in. But majority of the time the sides fall between the bungees, see the pics below...

It started out nice and neat. Took this to Three D metals in Birmingham from Cressona. But once I got into Virginia it all fell apart. Air pockets formed and very loose. Below is where I tried a new method, instead of folding the sides up I rolled them up.

So far so good on my journey to Cressona. Still nice and tight, not flapping in the wind and no air bubbles. A little surprised at how smooth the process was going until I came to the ends...This is the little issue I had lol

I had no clue what to do at this point lol. Did the best I could and just tucked them in. I have a lumber tarp on the front, put my rolled up tarp in front of it to help with the wind, and a steel tarp on the back. The lumber tarp irritated me. This load needs 2 steel tarps on it. Underneath are aluminum rods.

I do the same steps you listed when tarping a load. It always starts out fine but going down the road it gets loose, air pockets form and the sides slip between the bungees. Any thoughts on why it slips between the bungees or what I can do to fix that problem?

It's kind of hard to tell how you have the tarp wrapped around the front so I really can't comment on a solution to the issue you have.

With regards to air getting up underneath the tarp, to a certain extent that's going to happen no matter how well you secure it. The key for me is to really try to pull the tarp as tight as you can lengthwise. And then at tight as you can down to to the rub rail.

Yesterday I made some comments concerning the belly straps. I stand corrected today. I was using my phone and didn't see the photo very well. Today I broke out my laptop and I see he has seven bundles and therefore three tiers. There are six bundles comprising the first two tiers with the seventh one on top of the load. He also has two belly straps in place. So TwoSides did an excellent job on this load. Well done sir!

Twosides, I have to again caution against the placement of the winches above your trailer tires. That's a recipe for disaster. A significant bump in the road or loss of air to your suspension could drive your tire up into the winch, destroying the tire and potentially doing far more damage.

Portable ratchets or pocket winches should be used in all instances where you need a strap over the tires.

TwoSides I really like your careful approach to flatbedding. I wish more of my coworkers had your mindset. I see too many of them just hook up to a preloaded trailer and just go without double checking straps and adding bungies or properly post tripping trailers so they aren’t leaving problems for the next guy. Your securement looks good to me and like Old School said with that one pic you posted with the pipe it’s fine that your straps aren’t touching the sides since the pipe is banded.

I wish I could help more with the questions about bungees and tarps but your trailers are a lot different than the trailers I haul so my techniques wouldn’t work the same for you probably. On our trailers all our winches are bolted to the side of the trailer already and we have hooks for the D-rings bolted on the opposite side and they alternate winch to hook to winch etc. we also have smaller hooks on our trailers for tarp securement that are under the rub rail so I just pull the edge of my tarp over the rub rail a little and pinch it down with the bungees to form a seal and keep it from ballooning. Depending on the load I also have to pinch the end of my strap bundle in the winch a little sometimes because of the way our winches and hooks protrude out from the side of the trailer so I can’t always pinch my excess strap between the strap and the rub rail like on your trailers.

Looks like you’re really starting to get the hang of it, keep up the good work man!

Most of my loads are the same all the time (drywall, Home Depot/Lowes, salt/mud/sand, steel) but sometimes I get some different ones. Here are a couple pics for reference on how our trailers are different like I was telling you

I thought this load was interesting until it was time to unload it. Both stops didn’t have the right equipment to unload it and we had to get…creative lol