</font><font color="blue" class="small">( While there are a couple high quality trailer brands out there, MOST trailers are not very well built )</font>
For sure, Bob's right on the mark. Our new Haulmark enclosed race car hauler came with "ventilated" wheel box corner welds--Swiss cheese holes big enough to see daylight and let rain inside, too. Also, rear ramp door is mis-aligned. Right side is full 1.5 inches higher than left. Our dealer is great, and she took care of the welds. At the end of the season, they will send trailer back to Haulmark to fix the door (under warranty). So, given the quality control issues with most trailers, if you are buying new, make sure you hook up with a reputable dealer who is willing to work with the manufacturer on your behalf.
Another observation from the school of hard knocks is that the most durable trailers are the all aluminum ones. Livestock haulers must know something. Around here, they mostly use Featherlite
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We have a Featherlite dual axle open hauler, and it's the best made trailer we've had. Moreover it is LIGHT. Did I say light? That means you can have a bigger payload w/o exceeding the GVWR for the trailer+payload+vehicle.
Outside storage is pretty much the norm. The only maintenance item I would underscore is the importance of re-packing the wheel bearings once a year (or every ~15K miles if you do a lot of hauling). Some of the higher end units have lifetime bearings, meaning no repacking. Others have "EZ lube" bearings with a Zerk fitting. Just pump your grease gun until you see you've replaced old stuff with new. Makes a messy job pretty tolerable.
That's my $0.02...
