My open trailer tires are 15 years old so I thought I should replace them before going to Beaver springs (800+ miles). The trailer tows beautifully withe the F78 x 14 tires that are now on it. Should I replace them with bias belted trailer tires or radial trailer tires? The difference in price isn't a problem but I want it to continue to track as it does now. I haul a 3300 pound car on it. thanks. Sylvanus
I'd run radials. A lot of guys won't agree but I've never run trailer tires. When my trailer was 16' I ran 15" car tires, then a light truck 15". When I stretched it to 24' I changed to 8 lug axles and 16" 10 ply truck tires. I've pulled that trailer well over 50,000 mi and had one tire separate when I had 15's on it and no problems with the 16". I would definitely get rid of the 15 year old tires
Switch to the heaviest trailer tire you can buy. Car or truck tires are not suited for trailer use and never ever use a trailer tire on a car or truck.
ALL trailer tires EXCEPT Goodyear are made in CHINA, POS everyone. After much damage to my trailer I went with 16 inch E rated truck tires and after 30k miles no problems. I bought new 15 inch E rated trailer tires and having 7 blowouts/tread seperations I gave up. Never another Chineese POS on mine. Goodyear moved their production back to US after so many damage claims, they are the only company that pays for damage to your trailer.
Trailer will ride much better with radials. They absorb much more road shock than Bias tires, which will means less wear on trailer components and your towed vehicle. Your empty trailer will also bounce around less and track better. Goodyear marathon trailer tires are the best I've found\for the $$$. Some states will impound your trailer if it has car tires on it. You put a ton of money in your show or race car, never cheap out on the trailer that's towing it !!!!
I have been running tandem car hauler trailers for more than 15 years and early on used Goodyear ST trailer tires. I am careful about maintain tire pressure etc. But I started having tire problems..the first didn't bother me..anything can fail. But then, they started failing with regularity. I usually towed about 7500 miles, or so, a year. I found Kumho radial trailer tires at Tire Rack and stated using them. Tire problems disappeared ! The 14" in 205/75-14 is what I used. More recently I bought a heavier duty trailer and Kumho does not have a size suitable for it. I am likely to switch to the heaviest ply rating in light truck tires for it when the need arises. But if Kumho had a tire of the needed size, based on my experience to date, I would use them on this one. I still have my earlier trailer with the Kumho tires.
How fast do you go and how much weight do you carry? Heavy loads and keep it below 60, you can use trailer tires. Not so heavy loads and over 60, better use light truck tires.
radial trailer tires are better as the sidewalls take alot of the twisting thats involved from the built in toe the axles have and won't heat up as much , run the heaviest ply you can put on and always run them at the sidewall pressure . as for running car and truck tires , do not do it , as their ply rating is not true to its bias equivelent to is how they rate them ( cooper is the worst on this ) . and some tires do not have the sidewall structure needed for the extra twisting and heat build up and will cause a belt or sidewall failure . as for brands , I have used goodyear in the past with mixed results , for a while I was having tread failures , in recent years they have seem to have fixed the problem according to some freinds . I have been using Carlisle tires ( radial trails ) with good results in the mean time ... and they are Made in Carlisle PA .
I bought my trailer NEW about 18 years ago. It CAME with car tires on it. I ran those tires about 14 years and never any problems. I replaced them about 4 years ago with bias trailer tires, biggest mistake ever!!!! They wear stupid and the trailer wonders more. Probably gonna need to replace them soon.... with CAR tires! the only reason I replaced them in the first place was because of weather cracking, not because they were worn out!
betcha the car tires were radials , and when you put the bias on there they catch every groove in the road like a standard bias car tire will ( more like a 10 ply bias belt truck tire which have super stiff sidewalls) , put a radial trailer tire on there and it will handle lots better just like the radial car tires . one of the biggest problems I have seen with trailer tires is people underestimating the weight of the rig loaded . ( I had a old missouri built channel iron ( more like wrought iron ) steel deck 18 ' trailer that most trailer places sell I thought weighed about 2 K was 3300 pounds ) . and overloading or running the tire right at its maximum . load it up hook up the eq hitch if you use it and weigh the trailer ( a eq hitch will ad more weight to the trailer axles as it takes it off the back of the towing vehicle and puts it at the ends of the combined vehicles ), . your tires should have 10% safe zone to make them happy . for 4 c rated tires thats 6500 pounds max ( 7280 is max capacity for 205/15 c's ) I learned alot about tires from driving /servicing/owning big trucks , and it all applys ,
The problem with radial trailer tires is they're Chinese built crap. For the past 35+ years I've had anywhere from one to five trailers at any given time. Ran bias on some and radials on some. I don't plan on ever running another radial trailer tire. Many people have made the switch from trailer radials to truck radials and report good results. I haven't tried it myself. One of my trailers (14K dump) will be getting new tires in a couple of weeks....if my tire guy can get them, they'll be bias ply. If not, they'll be Michelin truck radials. Either of those choices will be better than the chinese trailer radials.
check carlisle tires , I had to run 14.5's on a semi lowboy and they held up real good and they were not at the time chinese made .
I also would not take special trailer tires ( ST) , because they are only given more maximum load because for the lower speed of 65 m/h there is more deflection allowed. I Made a topic about how to compare tires when wanting to chanche on RV-forum. http://www.rv.net/forum/index.cfm/fuseaction/thread/tid/27477930.cfm Read it and learn , but keep in mind it only goes for radial tires , wich most are nowadays.
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