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Trailer brakes getting hot and blowing tire?

J

Justin SE IOWA

Member
On my 33 foot horse trailer the left front tire blew out. It was a 7.5 x 16 bias ply tire. It only had 2k miles on it. So I put on the spare witch was the same size and it was brand new. About 60 miles from home it blew and shredded also. So I bought a 235-85/16 radial and have went about 500 miles now with no problem. BUT I also turned the electric brake box off because someone told me that the brake could be dragging and making excessive heat. When the trailer is jacked up the wheels spin freely and I repacked the wheel bearings this spring. The axles dont look bent of out of line either. Any thoughts or is a mere conwindinse that the tires blew?
 
My thoughts would be the tires looked good but had
dry rot. I just made a 7000 mile trip with a 5th
wheeler and didn't have any problem. I had new tire
and got brakes hot more then once going down 7%
grades.
 
For the brakes to heat up the surrounding area enough to blow out the tire the drum would have to be glowing red.
For the brakes to be holding enough to scrub the tire across the pavement causing excessive heat; the brakes would be smoking from heat.

The only thing I can think of would be old or cheap underrated tires not holding the load; not enough air in the tire causing excessive heat.

Usually with out of line scrubbing you will get a weird wear rather than blow outs.
 
The tires are about 5 years old but were never on the road. I dont think the brakes are the issue either but Im no expert! Thanks
 
What ply rating where the bias tires??? It seems that the newer bias tires are not holding up very well. Have several on wagons that have not lasted a few years when the old tires next to them are twenty years old or more. I think the quality of the bias tires has gone down. Could be the fact that almost all vehicles use radial tires so the bias tires are only on trailers and implements. It is much smaller market so maybe the competition is less.

I agree with the other posters in that for the brakes to make your tire blow they would have been real hot when you changed the tire. Also that alignment issues usually cause wear issues not blow outs.

I would turn the electric brakes back on and just try to find radial tires for your trailer. The next trip stop after the first few miles and see if the brakes are getting hot.

PS. Did you get your JD 4010 shifting issue figure out?? Hope my comment did not PO you. I did not think about it sounding that way. I really was just trying to tell you an external issue was better/cheaper for you.

Have a good Sunday!!
 
I pull a horse trailer a lot and have blown a few tires. Air pressure is critical. I keep mine, 10 plys, at 80 lb. Are you useing TRAILER tires? Trailer tires get really hot at low pressure.
Passenger or truck tires will not take the sidewall flexing tnat happens when you turn sharply.

How are you loading the horses? Is one axle getting an excess amount of the load?

A friend had a bent axle on his trailer and blew 3 tires in a few months...should show bad wear, and get very hot.
 
(quoted from post at 10:24:24 08/11/13) The tires are about 5 years old but were never on the road. ...
Click to expand...

HIGHWAY tires that old are at the end of their useful life even if never used. RV owners run into that all the time. Five-six year old tires even with very low/no mileage are a blowout waiting to happen.

For off road, low speed tires that doesn't apply as much, but they aren't subjected to the stress that a highway tire is.
 
A few more thoughts about horse trailer tires.

Check your hitch height. If too high or too low it can overload one of the axles and ...the tires.

Story... a few years ago i bought a 5 year old horse trailer that had sat in a darkend garage since new. It had only hauled one horse, one trip of a few miles. For all intent it was brand new with new factory tires. I blew all 4 tires and the spare in the first year of hauling horses. Those 5 years really hurt those tires.

I only haul my own horses but i have hauled over a hundred thousand miles in the last 5 years.
I buy the best tires i can find and even they don't last too long. For some reason horse trailer tires blow out long before they wear out.
 
I purchased a cheap IR thermometer from HF. I use it to measure brake temp. That tells me if one brake is pulling harder than the other. Great way to adjust brakes.

I had to replace one electro-magnet and it pulled harder than the rest. Instead of replacing all them, I places a resistor in series with magnet to remove some bias.
 
It is becoming a problem on low mileage tires more than 3-4 years old. They just separate and blow out, regardless of the miles.
 
I had problem with heat, drum housing get so hot could not hold hand to it. this is a fairly new trailer with 10 ply radials with proper tire pressure. removed wheel and brake drum checking all moving parts, my problem was the pivot point on the swing arm brake magnet was rusty and would not drop back upon releasing brake. clean this pivot point up put just a little grease on arm hole and pin, this fixed my heat problem. hope this will help someone.
 
No one has mentioned the obvious, were they Chinese
tires ? All the ones I have ever delt with were
defective within a thousand miles
 
You most likely cured the problem when you installed the radial tire. Bias trailer tires today are junk.

Rod
 
Always check the age of the tires, and cover the ones that get full
sun, if possible. Near the bead of the tire, you will find the letters
DOT, and a 4 digit #. The first 2 digits are the week, the tire was
made, last 2 are the year. IE: 2012= 20th week of 2012
 
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