Replacing a trailer floor

[MrsderPunkt]

We've just bought an old Rice Europa pony trailer which needs a bit of tlc. Frame & chassis sound, brakes & electrics good (although needs a few lenses and an interior light). The flooring was tongue & groove running lengthways, with shaped planks crossways, some of which were a bit soft so we've ripped them out.

Current thinking is to replace with 22mm Buffalo Board/Wysadeck or 'another' phenolic coated board. It's sold as non-slip, but not exactly sure how non-slip it is? Does anyone have a trailer with this type of flooring? And if so, do you put rubber mats on as well? I would prefer not to put mats down as don't want to trap any moisture.

The other option would be simply replacing with new hardwood planks.

Does anyone have any thoughts and/or experience with replacing trailer floors?

And if popular opinion is mats, do you have any recommendations for something easily removeable?

Please don't use ply. The supporting struts on a Rice are too far apart for the strength of the board.

When I replace Rice floors I use tongue and groove, cut to size/shape and thoroughly coated with a mixture of linseed oil and turps 2:1, fitted in the same way as the original floor, so a layer front to back, then a layer side to side.

Or you could consider having aluminium planks fitted, which would be longer lasting, but please get a professional to fit.

If you are anywhere near shropshire I can recommend a really good guy to do the work for you :)

About 12yrs ago I had the floor replaced in Bahill (same design as Rice) by local trailer firm. They put hardwood planks front to back and I used removeable rubber mats on top. They said they only ever had to replace the odd plank on these floors and the floor is still great.
I take the mats up now and then to let it it air but have always found it dry underneath.
It wasn't cheap but worth the money!

Thank you - but my original post isn't clear - we've only removed the top 'short' planks, the lengthways ones are sound and have been left in situ. It's only the top layer that is being replaced so the phenolic board will be more than strong enough. It was more the surface that I was questioning - is it really non-slip enough for a trailer floor?

(and we're miles from Shropshire, but thanks for the offer)

Sorry, completely misread the OP then! :D

Personally then I would rather not have phenolic ply with nothing on top. Lightweight mats, removed when the trailer is not in use, would be what I'd prefer. I agree with you about mats trapping moisture, and always remove mine from wooden floors when I'm not using the trailer :)

I did look for the shaped top boards when I refloored my Rice, but they did seem very expensive, and I couldn't decide if the shaping would make them less slippy, but harder to stand comfortably on.