Advice for those traveling with comp. trailers.

[ModelMaker]

There is a lot of great advice in this thread. We had a blow out coming home from the Jack 2 years ago in the middle of nowhere Nebraska on our dual axel trailer. This is not fun when it's you and your wife on the side of an interstate in below freezing weather. We limped into the next town tire shop and the guy said we were lucky another 100 miles and it would have been a 4 tire blowout.

Speed, tire pressure and how long you have had your tires.

Did he happen to mention why you were going to lose the other 3?
Ed

 

[Skip]

This should be a sticky

 

[CBQ]

Tire manufacturers put load ratings and max pressure ratings on tires for a reason. It covers their arse. ,,, The pressure on the tire is the best bet cause the manufacturer put it there.

Could be true on trailers, I just inflate to max rating on my trailers. The RV is a little different since there is a very broad range the tires can operate at. (70-110 PSI for mine. I run at 90 PSI in the front and 95 in the rear, which supports the max rating for the front and rear axles. I wouldn't need higher PSI unless I was overloading the axles, which I'm not.

 

[cpw]

Took the advice of the thread and checked our tires before we left, 3 of the 4 tires were 10 pounds under.

 

[Podge]

CPW, that's 2 for 2 who has checked because of this thread and reported too low of pressure. Should show that it can be a common issue.

 

[Pappy Q]

CPW, that's 2 for 2 who has checked because of this thread and reported too low of pressure. Should show that it can be a common issue.

Make it 3 for 3. I checked mine this morning and they were at 80-85 and supposed to be at 110. Thanks Podge!

 

[timzcardz]

4 for 4

Just checked mine and topped them off.

Thanks.

 

[SOB]

I will check asap. I would be dumb to bet I wouldn't make it 5 for 5. Thanks for all the info. New to the trailer world. All the info here is Great!!

 

[Podge]

Thought it was worth bumping this thread. Starting to get warm outside, and more and more of us will be competing.

 

[Blanton]

Reminds me of friends going up north with a snowmobile trailer. They stopped and purchased three tires along the way because they kept blowing. Turns out the cause was buying off the shelf and putting on without checking the true air pressure because they felt firm.

 

[cpw]

Thought it was worth bumping this thread. Starting to get warm outside, and more and more of us will be competing.

Every time we use the trailer now, first thing we do before leaving the house is check the tire pressure. 8 times out of 10, they need to be topped off.

 

[wrenfro12]

This has been a great read full of valuable info. I am making the maiden voyage on Friday with my new trailer( New to me). I did purchase a spare last week. I still have not pulled it fully loaded. The brakes are being serviced today and that should be the last thing before I load the smoker and all the other contest equipment.

 

[tigerpaw]

Great read for sure on all the comments and opinions. But one I have yet seen mentioned that we have first, second and third hand knowledge on having had it happen, once, twice and yes three times. Trailers parked on ground for long periods of time.
We had a fairly new tire go out. Replaced it. Did not ask questions.
Had a 2nd go out on opposite side. Same thing, replaced and went about our way. 3rd one went and now we are wondering is trailer overloaded or miss weight rated? Found everything was at it should be for weight, tire psi, etc. What we found was trailer tires do not like being parked directly on the ground over time. Several articles in camping magazines explained the issue along with talking with our tire guy after 3rd issue that tires on the ground can dry rot and sun can help makes things worse. We now store our fire trailer on wood flats with metal grating allowing air flow under tires AND out of the sun. Just offering another issue others have found as a cause of tire issues on trailers. Safe Travels to all!

 

[Slamdunkpro]

This has been a great read full of valuable info. I am making the maiden voyage on Friday with my new trailer( New to me). I did purchase a spare last week. I still have not pulled it fully loaded. The brakes are being serviced today and that should be the last thing before I load the smoker and all the other contest equipment.

Make sure that the hitch and everything else is properly set up. Don't assume that the safety chains, break away brake activator cable and the hitch is set up correctly from the factory. I picked mine up last week and both the safety chains and break away cables needed to be shortened. Remember the break away cable needs to be shorter than the safety chains at their maximum extension and not attached to the safety chain hook.

 

[Willy's Q Shack]

Wow! Lots of great info. I just bought a comp trailer, used but new to me. It's only two years old and I noticed that all four tires are extremely worn on the outside edges with the right rear being all but bald. Maybe a 3 inch strip of treads left on it. I thought that might be because of the original owner having his smoker on that corner but the tires all show signs of being drastically under inflated. I'm glad I came across this topic. My original plan was to just replace all of the tires and think nothing of it, now I know what to watch for!

 

[Slamdunkpro]

Wow! Lots of great info. I just bought a comp trailer, used but new to me. It's only two years old and I noticed that all four tires are extremely worn on the outside edges with the right rear being all but bald. Maybe a 3 inch strip of treads left on it. I thought that might be because of the original owner having his smoker on that corner but the tires all show signs of being drastically under inflated. I'm glad I came across this topic. My original plan was to just replace all of the tires and think nothing of it, now I know what to watch for!

Trailer tires are only good for about 10,000 miles. If they're bias ply even less.

 

[KC_Bobby]

Great read for sure on all the comments and opinions. But one I have yet seen mentioned that we have first, second and third hand knowledge on having had it happen, once, twice and yes three times. Trailers parked on ground for long periods of time.
We had a fairly new tire go out. Replaced it. Did not ask questions.
Had a 2nd go out on opposite side. Same thing, replaced and went about our way. 3rd one went and now we are wondering is trailer overloaded or miss weight rated? Found everything was at it should be for weight, tire psi, etc. What we found was trailer tires do not like being parked directly on the ground over time. Several articles in camping magazines explained the issue along with talking with our tire guy after 3rd issue that tires on the ground can dry rot and sun can help makes things worse. We now store our fire trailer on wood flats with metal grating allowing air flow under tires AND out of the sun. Just offering another issue others have found as a cause of tire issues on trailers. Safe Travels to all!

Is it also true that parking for a long period of time directly on concrete is bad? I also store my 5th wheel with the tires on plywood and tires covered.

 

[Gowan]

If you are replacing all your trailer tires every three years, checking inflation pressures and have run through the scales to verify the weight on each tire when fully loaded is within specs, you don't have to worry about special storage techniques.

If you run over-loaded, under-inflated tires or try to stretch the calendar to save buying new tires you will have blowouts, no matter how you store the trailer.

 

[Podge]

Another point about the break-away cables. The battery needs to be fully charged to make the emergency trailer brakes work when that cable is activated. Something else to check.

Another thing about tires. If you plan on upgrading from a 85 psi tire to a 110 psi tire, you need to check the pressure rating on the wheel. I’ve read that this is indicated on the back of the wheel. My plan this year is to replace all 4 with Goodyear 14 ply, 110 psi. I doubt that my pretty RV trailer wheels can handle that.. so I probably will have to drop $2,200 on a set of wheels/tires. But, when you have to change a tire on a highway, a foot away from screaming semi’s, it seems like a good deal.

 

[Smokin Mike]

Make sure that the hitch and everything else is properly set up. Don't assume that the safety chains, break away brake activator cable and the hitch is set up correctly from the factory. I picked mine up last week and both the safety chains and break away cables needed to be shortened. Remember the break away cable needs to be shorter than the safety chains at their maximum extension and not attached to the safety chain hook.

I got a question, where are you suppose to hook your break away to? I assumed to the safety chain hook.

When I bought my toy hauler, the salesman who was helping me hook the trailer up, decided to sew the break away into the safety chain (to save time, he said) I immediately undid it, looked unsafe to me.