Does a caravan or trailer need a pink slip in NSW?

Trailers and caravans of 4.5 tonnes or less need a safety inspection each year once they are more than five years old, the same as a car. Small ones are exempt: caravans under 411kg tare, and trailers under 251kg tare without brakes.

Does your trailer or caravan need a pink slip?

Trailers and caravans with an aggregate trailer mass of 4.5 tonnes or less are light vehicles, and the same rule applies to them as to cars: more than five years old, and they need a safety inspection report each year before the registration can be renewed.

There are exemptions, and they catch a lot of the small stuff:

• caravans with a tare weight under 411kg
• trailers under 251kg tare without brakes
• some conditionally registered and historic vehicles

So the little box trailer you use twice a year may well be exempt, while the camper behind it is not. Check the tare weight on the compliance plate before you assume either way.

Trailers with air or vacuum breakaway braking systems are outside the light vehicle safety check as well.

A trailer or caravan pink slip with us costs the same as a car’s: $140 on weekdays across most of Sydney, including GST. It costs more in some outer Sydney council areas, and weekends cost extra. Check your suburb’s price, or see caravan and trailer pink slips for what we need before we come out.

What does a trailer inspection check?

The inspection follows the Transport for NSW standards for light trailers and caravans. It is a shorter list than a car, because there is no engine, but the things it does cover are the things that hurt people.

The coupling and drawbar

The most important part of a trailer is how it stays attached. It fails if any coupling component is loose or cracked, if the drawbar isn’t securely mounted or is cracked, or if mounting bolts and welds have advanced corrosion.

The coupling also has to display its gross mass rating and the manufacturer’s name or trademark. Worn couplings sometimes get replaced with something unmarked, and that is an automatic fail.

Safety chains

A trailer without breakaway brakes needs at least one safety chain or wire rope, permanently attached to the drawbar. It fails if a chain touches the ground, or is long enough to stop a breakaway device working, or is attached with shackles rather than permanently.

Chain and shackle sizes have to match the trailer’s mass, and the standards set a minimum for each weight range. Undersized chains on a heavier trailer are a common find.

Brakes

Where brakes are fitted, they have to work. Override brakes are tested by compressing the brake device and trying to move the trailer. Other brakes are tested hitched to the tow vehicle. The park brake gets the same treatment. Any visible brake component that leaks or isn’t securely mounted fails, as does a frayed or bared electric brake wire and a missing, broken or frayed brake cable.

Tyres, wheels and lights

Same standards as a car. Tyres are checked for tread depth and for cuts, bulges or exposed cords. Wheels fail if cracked or buckled, or if a nut or stud is missing. Every lamp and reflector has to work, which on a trailer means tail lights, brake lights, indicators, the number plate light and the rear reflectors.

Tare, ATM and why the numbers matter

Two weights decide whether your trailer needs an inspection, and they are not the same thing.

Tare is what the trailer weighs empty. It is the number in the exemptions: under 411kg for a caravan, under 251kg for a trailer without brakes.

Aggregate trailer mass, or ATM, is the most the trailer is allowed to weigh fully loaded, including what is on the tow ball. It is the number that decides whether it counts as a light trailer at all, at 4.5 tonnes or less.

Both are stamped on the compliance plate. If the plate is missing or unreadable, that is worth sorting out before an inspection rather than during one.

Which brakes a trailer needs

NSW sets a trailer’s brakes by its gross trailer mass (GTM), the weight on its wheels when it’s loaded, not counting what sits on the tow ball:

• Up to 750kg GTM. No brakes needed. If brakes are fitted, they have to work.
• 751kg to 2,000kg. Brakes on both wheels of at least one axle.
• 2,001kg to 4,500kg. Brakes on every wheel, and an automatic breakaway system that brakes the trailer if it comes off the tow vehicle.

Safety chains go by the loaded weight too. Under 2,500kg needs at least one chain, and over 2,500kg needs two, crossed over when they’re connected.

The plate shows the GTM along with the tare and ATM, so check it before working out which brakes the trailer needs.

What tends to add cost

Trailers spend most of their life parked, and that is exactly why they fail. Things perish sitting still, and a van that has not moved since last summer is a different proposition from one that tows every month.

The items that often turn a trailer inspection into a bigger job are:

• Tyres. Trailer tyres usually age out before they wear out. A tyre with plenty of tread can still be past its life.
• Lamps and wiring. Trailer wiring lives outdoors, gets dragged over gutters and corrodes at the plug.
• Chains, couplings and fasteners. Rust that has gone past the surface, or a coupling that has been replaced at some point with one that carries no markings.
• Brakes. Where they are fitted, they have to work, and sitting idle does them no favours.

Caravans add the things a house has. Gas, water and internal wiring are not part of the safety check, but if the van has been sitting for a season, they are worth attending to while someone is already there.

Getting it ready for a mobile inspection

A mobile inspection has a few site rules that a station visit doesn’t.

• A hard, flat surface. Concrete or asphalt, with room to walk all the way around the trailer. Grass, gravel and soft ground aren’t suitable, and neither is a spot near a school or a busy footpath.
• The tow vehicle, if you can. Brakes other than override brakes, and the park brake, are tested with the trailer hitched up, and the lights only work with the plug connected.
• A readable VIN. The technician has to read the VIN or chassis number from the trailer itself, so clear away anything covering it.
• Daylight. Mobile inspections happen in daylight, so a van stored in a dark shed needs to come out into the open.

If the site isn’t suitable, the technician can’t inspect it there, and it’s better to know that before the day.

If the rego has run out

Trailers and caravans follow the same three-month line as cars. If the registration ran out less than three months ago, you can renew as usual once it passes. After that, it has to be registered again, which needs a blue slip, and a mobile inspection can only be used for a renewal.

Trailers and caravans don’t need a green slip, so once the pink slip is lodged, you can renew straight away. They don’t get the $100 rego discount either: private trailers and caravans are left out of it.

Booking one

A trailer or caravan is the awkward case for a workshop visit. It has to be towed, which means hitching it, finding somewhere to park a long vehicle, and waiting with it. A mobile inspection removes all of that, and it is one of the reasons people book us for a van and a car in the same visit.

Pink Slip Approach does caravan and trailer pink slips across Cumberland and the rest of Sydney, south to Waterfall. Book it as a mobile pink slip and put the trailer’s rego and make in the car details, or read how a mobile pink slip works first.