Trailer tires

Eric,

Thanks for the input. I've seen your helpful and enlightening posts
on many subjects in this forum, so I'm certainly paying attention to
your advice. My comments are inline below.

On Jan 21, 12:34*am, Eric Greenwell wrote:
I'm leaving this Friday to pick up a glider that I purchased 1100
miles away. *The trailer looks brand new, but is about 12 years old,
as are its tires. *The glider and trailer weigh in the vicinity of 950
#.

What is in it? It is worth weighing it if you are at all suspicious
about the claimed weight.

What's in it is a Russia AC4C, which weighs 330#. I've seen several
pictures, and am not suspicious of the weight. The owner who I've
talked to on the phone had no doubt of the weight, so I'm assuming he
weighed it at some point.


Assuming the 950 pounds is right... Unless you are towing this with a
Volkswagen Beetle, it seems unlikely such a light trailer will cause any
problems, regardless of the tires.

*The tire spec from the owner is :
Carlisle Sure Trail ST
ST205/75014 (replaces F78-14ST)
Max Load 1760 lbs @ 50 PSI *(actual load will be under 500 lbs)

The ST inflation chart show a load rating of 850 pounds at 15 psi! This
tire is serious overkill for the weight of your trailer. Even the
smaller ST175/R13 has a 670 pound rating at 15 psi.

If it were my trailer, I'd just put on passenger car tires with a speed
rating about 20 mph higher than I planned to tow, and a 1000 or so pound
load rating, then use the correct pressure for a 600-700 pound load.


From my experience towing things, some of which is a glider, that's
about where I was thinking of going. I have to buy the tires tonight,
and unless I see some serious refutation of this idea here today,
that's what I'll do. As far as the tire size, I'll probably try to
get around the same rolling radius, as we've already bought a drop
hitch to set the trailer level with the original tires. I'm sure I
can have the dealer look up the recommended inflation pressure for
that load.

I've only seen some pictures of the trailer, and I was inferring that
it had no suspension because there is probably only about 1-2" of
fender clearance, and in the picture, I can't see that the fenders are
free to move with the tires.

Ed

At 12:26 21 January 2009, flying_monkey wrote:

I've only seen some pictures of the trailer, and I was inferring that
it had no suspension because there is probably only about 1-2" of
fender clearance, and in the picture, I can't see that the fenders are
free to move with the tires.

It seems unlikely, but still possible, that the trailer suspension
has collapsed. More likely with one of those internal torsion
setups - guys at the field have had trouble with fixing those.
You might want to make sure what the situation is, because
the fix could be expensive.

Jim Beckman