[Real McCoy]

Man this topic is about as common as why won't my car hook up. I got up this morning and went to unload the car and one trailer tire is about flat. I get unloaded and pull the tire off. Check it and there is a little hole with nothing in it so I plug it up. Looking at the tire it just looked beat up so I decide I'll just get a new one. I go to put the spare tire on and the friggin spare has a big knot on it and the belts are busted. It's been inside the trailer for a couple years and was a good used tire when I mounted it. I call my buddy at the tire store and tell him to get me 2 new tires. They'll be here tomorrow so I go to put a jack stand under the trailer and I'm looking at some funny rusty marks by the axel mount. Get to looking and the welds on the torsion axel mounting plate are cracked. So now I have to pull all the wheels and check all these axel mount welds. If they fail the axel would be floating on one side unsecured the the frame. So my point in this is check your axel mount plates anytime you are working on tires and check your tires often including the spare. RM

 

[TooLateVTEC]

Damn man, aint that some shit.

Thanks for the heads up...what kinda tires are they?

Reason I ask is b/c we had new (less than 2 years old) Titan tires on our 28' enclosed and we were checking them out and adding grease to the bearing and noticed one of them had busted belts like your describing. None of the others were a problem so we replaced that one and the spare. On the way to Atco to get our licenses one of the ones we didnt replace blew on 95 only 45 min into the trip. We had to unload the car on the shoulder b/c the jack wouldnt lift the trailer with the car in it....what a cluster phuck. Ill never own Titan tires again...Carlisles are on it now.

 

[Real McCoy]

The one that was beat up looking from wear and hitting curbs was a Goodyear Marathon. It was new last year. the spare was a Tow Master and was the best of a set of four I had on the trailer a few years ago. 11 yrs I've had this enclosed trailer with 5 lug C rated tires and I have never had a blow out yet. I have no explanation why cause I've got alot of friends who have tire problems as often as most of us get heartburn. I just accept the good fortune and continue to do what I do. RM

 

[TOPLESS63]

28 FT CLASSIC 10,000 LBS 2357515 MICHILEN LTX M/S .REPLACE EVERY 6 YEARS DUE TO DRY ROT . I PUT 15,000 MILES ON TRAILER A YEAR.REPACK AND CLEAN BEARING EVERY YEAR PLUS BRAKE SHOES.TRAILER TIRES ARE SPEED RATED TOO LOW. GET HOT AND BLOW OUT.

 

[TooLateVTEC]

28 FT CLASSIC 10,000 LBS 2357515 MICHILEN LTX M/S .REPLACE EVERY 6 YEARS DUE TO DRY ROT . I PUT 15,000 MILES ON TRAILER A YEAR.REPACK AND CLEAN BEARING EVERY YEAR PLUS BRAKE SHOES.TRAILER TIRES ARE SPEED RATED TOO LOW. GET HOT AND BLOW OUT.

Hell, ours is 6 lug 5,000 lbs and the tires were one load range ABOVE what they were supposed to be.

 

[Mach1Marauder]

The one that was beat up looking from wear and hitting curbs was a Goodyear Marathon. It was new last year. the spare was a Tow Master and was the best of a set of four I had on the trailer a few years ago. 11 yrs I've had this enclosed trailer with 5 lug C rated tires and I have never had a blow out yet. I have no explanation why cause I've got alot of friends who have tire problems as often as most of us get heartburn. I just accept the good fortune and continue to do what I do. RM

You're lucky as hell!!!!!
I went thru 7 Goodyear Marathon (last revision)with 4 blowouts! I liked them at first. They wore great! Ft Worth to Norwalk and the STILL had the little tits on the tread. Treadwear was great, but they started to blow at roughly 25K. I'm super anal about tire pressures, proper loading and don't speed(towing), so it wasn't that.

 

[TOPLESS63]

MINE ARE SIX LUG AND THE LTX M/S IS ONLY A 6 PLY. NEVER GET HOT LIKE GOODYEARS DID. 70-75 MPH FOR 5-6 HOURS

 

[quickwrench]

My opinion...the only decent tires GY makes are slicks. The only high-load tires (Load C or higher) I've had good luck with are Michelins and...believe it or not...the ones sold at Northern Tool. (They're an American-made tire, can't remember the brand.)

Don't know if this helps or not, but there's three main reasons the belts break most of the time. One is just plain low quality on the belts and ply layers. Second is heat...not all of it comes from the road either. Most guys (me included) have their axles overloaded some. The spindles aren't as hefty, the bearings are smaller, and overall they just get hot as shit. If you don't have a kickass grease with a high drop point and keep them packed and full, lots of extra heat winds up transferring into the wheel and tire. (This is how the Barklage's Pro Mod trailer caught on fire, BTW. Axle ran low on grease, had the wrong grease to begin with, got everything hot as hell, caught the grease and tire on fire, then went on from there.

Third reason the belts go is water in the tire. Leaks in the bead and holes in the tire let water in a little at a time, and it stays in there and erodes the belts. I tell customers all the time...If you've got tires that leak very much air, you've got to address it.

 

[Rkfdspeed]

Tire quality has nose-dived in the last 10 years....The amount of overseas production has exploded and the once premium names have been exploited for their namesake. Ask anyone who is left in the tire industry and you will find there is a migration from anything of lasting quality...They are all pumping out JUNK!

 

[Marshall Stack]

My opinion...the only decent tires GY makes are slicks. The only high-load tires (Load C or higher) I've had good luck with are Michelins and...believe it or not...the ones sold at Northern Tool. (They're an American-made tire, can't remember the brand.)

Don't know if this helps or not, but there's three main reasons the belts break most of the time. One is just plain low quality on the belts and ply layers. Second is heat...not all of it comes from the road either. Most guys (me included) have their axles overloaded some. The spindles aren't as hefty, the bearings are smaller, and overall they just get hot as shit. If you don't have a kickass grease with a high drop point and keep them packed and full, lots of extra heat winds up transferring into the wheel and tire. (This is how the Barklage's Pro Mod trailer caught on fire, BTW. Axle ran low on grease, had the wrong grease to begin with, got everything hot as hell, caught the grease and tire on fire, then went on from there.

Third reason the belts go is water in the tire. Leaks in the bead and holes in the tire let water in a little at a time, and it stays in there and erodes the belts. I tell customers all the time...If you've got tires that leak very much air, you've got to address it.

Sean, that is good information. A couple of things I would like to add to this list are slip angle forces and impact breaks. Trailer tires are subjected to abuse your truck tires will not usually see. When cornering, the tires on the forward axle are seeing forces exactly opposite the tires on the rearward axle are experiencing. Think about it, a trailer does not have wheels that steer, so they basically turn like a skid loader does. This puts a bunch of lateral force upon the tires, and if already heavily loaded and hot, the tires are subject to enough pressure they will actually pull the tread apart. Impact breaks can occur when a tire smacks a curb during cornering or clipping the edge of a pothole while cornering. You don't have to be traveling fast for this to happen and sometimes it takes days, or even weeks for the damage to actually appear.



Marshall

 

[conbread]

hey Mccoy car was looking good at shadyside yesterday...good job buddy!!!

 

[Real McCoy]

Thanks, Was that your Mustang convertible I saw up on the 3rd level? My tire guy parked his rig up there and I went to visit and saw the car. He was just down from Smokins 56 Chevy. Didn't know it was a YB member but recalled the car when I saw your avatar.

The last GY Marathons I bought was for my utility trailer. Made in China marked on the side. The GY Marathons on the car trailer marked USA on them. We'll see what these new ones say. RM

 

[357windsor]

Damn this reminds be-time to do some trailer maint.

 

[SUPERGAS565]

If your trailer has 16" Wheels I highly recommend: Goodyear Unisteel RST's G-Rated 110psi Radials, hands down best trailer tire I have ever run

Rick

 

[dennysavage]

If your trailer has 16" Wheels I highly recommend: Goodyear Unisteel RST's G-Rated 110psi Radials, hands down best trailer tire I have ever run

Rick

You need to rob a bank to buy those....

 

[Mach1Marauder]

You need to rob a bank to buy those....

No lie!!!!

 

[Tims88]

Light truck tires do not have the sidewall construction that will tolerate trailer use. We have a triple axle float that will shred sidewalls after a few tight turns. We eventually went to Michelin XPS Ribs, and haven't managed to damage those yet.

I also had a twin axle landscaping trailer with 8 ply carlisles on it, that were / are 20 years old, and still look as new. It gets the snot kicked out of it by the current owner.

 

[Real McCoy]

I'm a 205-75-15 kind of guy. Haven't looked at any high end tires since what I have isn't failing on the road for me. RM

 

[Marshall Stack]

The XPS Ribs are a badass tire. These things actually have a steel ply in the freakin' sidewall!



Marshall

 

[Beyond]

I've been blowing 8 ply Denman's, anyone know of anything better in a 205x15? Can't get a bigger tire on it.