trailer help

shakin · Jun 8, 2009

i have a 16' flat deck trailer. with the ring style rims, with bias carlisle trailer tires. the trailer has a bounce to it when driving it worse when it's empty. when i spin the tire with the wheel off the ground it almost appears the tire is out of round not sure about the rim. are thse rims balanceable? can you over tighten the bolts and damage the rim? are the 5 plates supposed to have a noticeably larger hole the the bolt diameter. i just went through the suspension of the trailer hoping to fix replacing the equalizers and all of the shackles and bushings but the trailer still hops. i did find badly worn bolt and shackles. anyone have any ideas at certain speeds it's almost dangerous it move the back of the truck up and down.

pat32rf · Jun 8, 2009

Lift an axle off the ground and spin the tire. Side to side wobble shouldn't bother you too much, but the tire should be round and spin freely. When you lift one axle off the ground, does the tire always spin so one point is down? (assuming that the bearings/brakes are adjusted so the tire is free to spin). A tire shop can balance the tires on the trailer or you can do it yourself, if you have the wheel weights (used ones are normally free or almost so at tire shops).
When this style of rim is balanced it should be done on the axle as the brake drum might be out of balance as well. When you remove the tire from the trailer, index the rim to hub rotation and re-install it the same way, then check by spinning the tire and making sure that it stops at random points (its still in balance).
In general, trailer tires do not need to be balanced as precisely as your car tires if it is a single axle trailer but if its a tandem axle you can get a sympathetic vibration between axles that comes and goes and can really be noticable, especially if the shackle bolts/bushings are worn and the trailer empty.
These tire are normally a lot harder than car tires so they tend to bounce like an india rubber ball instead of a sponge ball as well.
When the trailer is empty, do you still have ample tonque weight?
While the retaining plates have oval holes, there is only one way that they fit between the rim and hub and should be tightened evenly when being installed, then re-torqued after a few miles driving.

Diamondpilot · Jun 8, 2009

First off you probably have Carlisle Bias tires, the worst tires on the market in my opinion. Trust me, I run a marine business and deal with about 75 trailers a year. Anything Carlisle has been a pain in my _________ for the last 10 years.

Secondly you have what I call mobile home rims. They are a pain in the ________ also. Between the tires and the rims you will never get it right and as soon as you do you will have a flat and have to start all over, at least that is the way my luck has been.

The best you can do is try to center the outer wheel on the inner wheel and tighten the bolts evenly. You will still have bounce at first because bias tires love to flat spot.

The best thing you can do is either live with it or replace the axles with a modern setup like some 3.5K or 6K Dexters and radial tires and proper wheels.

Chris

Groo · Jun 10, 2009

Bias plys can flat spot when they sit. it might round out when it warms up. it might not.

my dad's old trailer needed a flat changed. It took all 4 sides or the 4 way to remove one tire.

tighten up the bolts by the pattern, and do it a little at a time.

QRTRHRS · Jun 11, 2009

The wheel clamp holes will have some play in them but the hole appears to be excessively wore then replace it.

I would tighten those wheels the same as a "dayton" style, ie, spoked truck wheel. Not only tighten opposing nuts but rotate the wheel while you seat the clamp a little at a time. I prefer to tighten the nut on the bottom as I do this. As you get them tighter, rotate the wheel fast enough to see if you have the wobble out of it. If it wobbles, loosen the nuts and clamps and try again.

Once satisfied that the wheel is straight and the nuts are fairly tight, gently tap the side of the clamp with a ballpeen hammer. This will further "seat" the clamps allowing you to tighten the nuts a bit more. Drop the axle so you can finish tightening to spec or "feel".

When you stop to recheck the nuts after driving some, you should notice that seating the clamps has minimized the amount of retightening.

For occasional use like bringing in the hay crop, the axles are fine but I agree with Diamondpilot about an upgrade.

jwstewar · Jun 11, 2009

QRTRHRS said:
I would tighten those wheels the same as a "dayton" style, ie, spoked truck wheel. Not only tighten opposing nuts but rotate the wheel while you seat the clamp a little at a time. I prefer to tighten the nut on the bottom as I do this. As you get them tighter, rotate the wheel fast enough to see if you have the wobble out of it. If it wobbles, loosen the nuts and clamps and try again.

I watched Dad put a many of these tires on out along the side of a road late at night when he would go out on a service call. He would always lay his sledge hammer on its edge up close to the tire and rotate the tire. Where ever it would get closer to the sledge, he knew he had to tighten that nut up some more to pull it in line with the rest of them. I've probably watched him do it a thousand times, I hate to think how many times he did it in his 40+ years in the tire business.

QRTRHRS · Jun 11, 2009

jwstewar said:
I watched Dad put a many of these tires on out along the side of a road late at night when he would go out on a service call. He would always lay his sledge hammer on its edge up close to the tire and rotate the tire. Where ever it would get closer to the sledge, he knew he had to tighten that nut up some more to pull it in line with the rest of them. I've probably watched him do it a thousand times, I hate to think how many times he did it in his 40+ years in the tire business.

A good many of those tire changes were done without benifit of air tools as well? I got pretty good at tightening by eye due to getting paid little or nothing to change a tire. Your dad probabley changed a good many split rims in that time as well? A mentor taught me to lightly tap the ring or rings in the case of a 3 piece rim with a hammer to seat them during inflation.

shakin · Jun 12, 2009

i think i'll go the route of radial tires if i cant ge the bounce out of it. i don't necessarily buy the fact that i'll have to live with it there are a good many trailers with this type of wheel even new ones built today i cant believe that all of these bounce. i bought this used and i have no idea of how it acted new but if it bounced new if i had bought it new the dealer would have gotten it back. i made a point to watch all of the equipment trailers in my area and see what they have for a setup id say half are like mine. in fact i saw a good many hudson trailers like this some of these looked new. there are alot of hudson trailers in my area i noticed. mine is built by ls line manufacturing in tennessee

jwstewar · Jun 13, 2009

QRTRHRS said:
A good many of those tire changes were done without benifit of air tools as well? I got pretty good at tightening by eye due to getting paid little or nothing to change a tire. Your dad probabley changed a good many split rims in that time as well? A mentor taught me to lightly tap the ring or rings in the case of a 3 piece rim with a hammer to seat them during inflation.

Yep, he sure did. I believe the 3 piece ones were the ones named "suicide" rims. Dad still has his airless tire wrench for semis. I don't know how he ever picked the thing up. I swear it weighed as much as he did (he only weighs 120 lbs and at his heaviest he was 132 lbs). Once in awhile he would go make some money and change a tire on the side. Since he didn't have a compressor or the wrench at home, he would take that and a 12 foot pipe. Only saw a couple he couldn't get off - that included with air wrench. If he couldn't get it off, if it were a steering axle or outside duel, he would just change it on the truck. I only got to see him do that a couple of times, I'm sure he did it more during the day than I got to see on the nighttime service calls or the Saturday's when I got to go with him to work. Man, OSHA would have a fit with a 8 - 9 year old going to the places I did with Dad on those calls. I remember when we went to the plant part of Mead Paper, I had to stay in the truck because I didn't have hard hat & steel toed shoes.