Tire Wear

[C Shiner]

All,



I put 3,000 miles on my Z7 trailer (the blank steel wheels) and the one tire on the inside was almost bald; I loosened up the calipers so the wheels would spin free and both sides spun no where close to true in any direction. Now I know why I felt a bump / hump feeling when towing at slow speed. I just purchased new aluminum wheels and tires.



Have any of you experience odd tire wear issues? I am concerned that the axle is bent or out of alignment but maybe it's just bad wheels and tires.



Chaz



P.S. I checked the bearings, no problem there, in good condition and not too loose of tight.

 

[Randy Walls]

Very well could be the axle is undersized and not designed to carry the weight properly. I have read this several times about some trailers from Nitro. I would start the process of contacting the dealership, etc.....



Randy!

 

[TOMMY RICH]

A very common problem. I haven't been able to get my tires to wear decent at all since I've owned them. Balanced tires and always 50 PSI. I think it's poor design of the axles like Randy said.

I've also had the alignment checked and the guy said it wasn't out enough to mess with...go figure.

When I went from the bias pliy tires from the factory to radials...it did improve but, still have wear on the outside edges.

 

[Scott Randolph]

Undersize axles I think are common across many manufacturers. I once owned a rig that if you followed behind it on a bouncy road you could literally see the camber changing as the boat bounced up and down and the tires wore abnormally on the sides. A local trailer shop arched my axle till the camber was correct under normal load of the boat and then welded heavy angle steel across the top of the axle to strengthen it. Not expensive to do and it cleaned up all abnormal tire wear.

 

[Jim B]

On my Z7 i initially had abnormal tire wear as well. I think the problem was two fold, issue #1 was out of balance rims the other was low quality tires. I replaced the rims and put quality tires on it and the problem has been solved.

 

[Carl S]

I had the same problem with extreme inside tire wear on my 1999 pt185 trailer. I replaced the axle with a 3500 lb. rated axle this year. The trailer is rated for 3000 lb. I firmly believe the original axle was underrated. My original axle tube diameter was around 1 1/2" and my friends axle tube diameter on his 2001 pt175 is every bit of 2" and no tire wear problem. I fought this problem for almost ten years by constantly rotating and flipping the tires on the rim by getting them remounted and buying new tires when necessary due to the uneven wear. None of the tires ever had more than 3000 miles on them and the boat is garaged kept, not sitting out in the sun.

The replacement axle is at least 2" or more in diameter and the tire wear is looking pretty even so far. Roughly 500 miles.

The total cost was around $265 delivered to my house. This included 2 new sets of springs, ultra lube axle spindles, 2 extra hub seals and all the necessary hardware to mount the axle to the springs.

The original axle was so bad that after a 450 mile trip with new tires, they already started showing extreme inside wear. Those little rubber "tits" , for lack of a better word, that come on new tires, were still on the outside treads of the tires. Kinda tells you that there was no contact with the road on the outside treads of the tire. Which to me indicates an overloaded axle. Note: The boat was never loaded with misc. heavy items when traveling and all the tires were/are ST radials.

 

[Jimmy Easterling]

Not too long ago I had an occasion to take the tires off and noticed that one side was wearing on the inside and the other on the outside of the tire. I put new wheels on when I got the boat and run Marathons at 46 psi. I would guess that I have close to 10,000 miles on them.

 

[TROY WAINRIGHT3]

Hey guys.Let me give you some advice on any new tires.Once the tire is on the rim have them road tested on the machine to check how true around they are.I have a duramax that i had new michelins put on at 425 a piece.After 6 months of vibtation and uneven wear they were road tested. Maximum out of roundness allowed is 25%.I had 1 at 15%,1 at 17%,1 at 71% and 1 at 75%.After contacting michelin with the percentages,they sent 2 new tires that were within specs.Rides smooth as a babys but- now.Most people dont know about the road testing machines.Hope this helps.

 

[TOMMY RICH]

Anybody ever bounce your trailer with the boat off? I have and it's downright scary!

There's part of the problem IMHO.