Trailer Tires..........

[GeoFisher]

I put new tires on my trailer about 3 years ago. I'm now getting some funky weary patterns and have been doing some research to try to figure out why.

While researching, I found this interesting site:

http://www.discounttire.com/dtcs/inf...rTireFacts.dos

I'm suspecting my wear issues are underinflation.......but here are my questions to you guys:

* The site above says you should only pull ST tires at a MAX of 65 mph. How many pull faster than that, and if so, how fast?

* The site above also says tires are usually only good for 5000 - 12000 miles. What do you guys generally get out of tires............I think I'm at about 7500 miles........

Thanks,

Geo

[ElectricSLT]

Thanks for that link - I didn't know you weren't supposed to exceed 65mph with trailer tires!
When we went to Lake Fork a couple of years back we drove 75-85 most of the way, these days usually 55-65.
I'm sure most of my tire problems are from underinflation and overloading because I have separation anxiety from leaving any of my crankbaits and/or plastics out of the boat. Its gotten better now that I carry a tire inflator/battery/jumper cable combo in the truck and air up before making a long return trip.
Don't keep a log for the trailer but seriously doubt I ever gotten over 7,500 miles on my trailer tires.

[GeoFisher]

Thanks for that link - I didn't know you weren't supposed to exceed 65mph with trailer tires!
When we went to Lake Fork a couple of years back we drove 75-85 most of the way, these days usually 55-65.
I'm sure most of my tire problems are from underinflation and overloading because I have separation anxiety from leaving any of my crankbaits and/or plastics out of the boat. Its gotten better now that I carry a tire inflator/battery/jumper cable combo in the truck and air up before making a long return trip.
Don't keep a log for the trailer but seriously doubt I ever gotten over 7,500 miles on my trailer tires.

7500 miles might be high........actually I've probably put WAY more on than that.

700 miles round trip to KY.........at least 20 trips since purchasing tires.
300 miles round trip to Dale.......again at least 20 trips since purchasing tires.

So 14000 and 6000 miles just to those two lakes.........about 20,000 miles........HM.

Maybe I'm doing GOOD............

Later,

Geo

[DSPCHAMY]

Depending on your type of tire there are several things that can happen. I ran radial tires for a few years and had to replace them often because the belts in the tires would break. If your boat sits for long periods of time and then you start pulling it at speed then you can snap the belts in your tires from the "flat spot" that it was sitting on.

I changed to 16 ply bias tires and never had the problem again. Ran the same tires for five years.

If you are running radial tires you should start the tow slow or move the boat to a diffrent location for a few hours before you start pulling so your tires will round back out.

If you watch your tires as you start to drive and you see them hopping a little and then it smothes out your tires have flat spotted.

just my experience with tires on my boat.

[Dizzle]

Good stuff Geo. I was getting ready to post about my "odd" wear pattern on my tandem axle trailer. It looks like it's time to buy some new tires.. I went down to check on my boat a few weeks ago. I have 4 ST 175/80D13's on my trailer. I noticed that both rear tires are feathered pretty bad and have chunks of rubber missing. The weird thing is that the front two don't have any of this wear pattern on them at all. My boat sees a lot of short trips. I store it down in Lucas and pull it to the Narrows.... LoL.. probably 3 or 4 miles round trip. The tires are 5 years old and I just wondered why the rears wear more than the fonts? I chawked it up to making those turns on the Narrows ramp?? Dunno.. Looks like I'll be investing in some new tires here pretty soon.

[Embrey]

Depending on your type of tire there are several things that can happen. I ran radial tires for a few years and had to replace them often because the belts in the tires would break. If your boat sits for long periods of time and then you start pulling it at speed then you can snap the belts in your tires from the "flat spot" that it was sitting on.

I changed to 16 ply bias tires and never had the problem again. Ran the same tires for five years.

If you are running radial tires you should start the tow slow or move the boat to a diffrent location for a few hours before you start pulling so your tires will round back out.

If you watch your tires as you start to drive and you see them hopping a little and then it smothes out your tires have flat spotted.

just my experience with tires on my boat.

you sure you dont have radial and bias ply backwards there?

[HURRICANEBOB]

Geo,
Answer I think has to be somewhat geared to tire used. Tires I used are 12 PLY, NYLON LOAD RANGE F, MAX LOAD 1765 LBS @ 110 PSI COLD,TOW-MASTER,20.5x8x10.

Tow speed: I run up to 75 with these. Total boat and trailer weight was about 3200 lbs, so tire weight rating gave me some room to breathe.

Age? 3-5 years max, but wear was not so much to tread as it was to the sidewalls that would start to show cracks. That told me the rubber was getting older and brittle and that meant I was risking a wall failure. So when they starting showing significant cracks, they got replaced.

Mileage: I never really tracked it, I went by tire tread depth with the Lincoln head penny depth guage, and if tread got shallow, I dumped the tire to reduce the possibility of puncture damage.

Wear patterns: If the tire is no longer round and tread depth varies you may have either a frozen set of springs, or a misaligned axle. Tread that wears more on the outside or inside of tires points mainly to misaligned axle...my experience.

[fyrfightr]

Good stuff Geo. I was getting ready to post about my "odd" wear pattern on my tandem axle trailer. It looks like it's time to buy some new tires.. I went down to check on my boat a few weeks ago. I have 4 ST 175/80D13's on my trailer. I noticed that both rear tires are feathered pretty bad and have chunks of rubber missing. The weird thing is that the front two don't have any of this wear pattern on them at all. My boat sees a lot of short trips. I store it down in Lucas and pull it to the Narrows.... LoL.. probably 3 or 4 miles round trip. The tires are 5 years old and I just wondered why the rears wear more than the fonts? I chawked it up to making those turns on the Narrows ramp?? Dunno.. Looks like I'll be investing in some new tires here pretty soon.

That is not uncommon with dual axle tires. The rear tires tend to be the ones dragged when making tight turns. On my 16' landscape trailer, I go through a set of back tires every summer.