Trailer tires - they bring to mind a few stories of my own.
Back in 1984 when I went into business with my old partner hauling auto parts from the SW USA, we had a 45' fifth wheel trailer with triple 9,000# Dexter axles. He had always run bias ply trailer tires & we would cook at least one tire on a round trip out West - sometimes 2 or 3. The bias ply tires could not take the heat. I'd be following him & blue smoke would start rolling off the affected tire, then chunks of tread & belts, then the tire would just disintegrate & we'd be on the side of the highway either replacing with a spare, or we'd be jacking-up the axle & chaining it to the frame. Did that many times in 100* + weather. THEN we switched to radial Cooper trailer tires & never had another tire failure.
Fast forward to 3 summers ago on a busy Saturday - heading 230 miles away for our annual summer vacation on the lake pulling a 17' 6" bass boat. What could possibly happen on a short trip like that? How about 50 miles down the highway from home? Well, the boat we typically use one week out of the year & otherwise sits in our garage with new-looking regular car tires decides to shed a tire. As I'm driving along at 70, I start feeling a vibration for about 5 minutes then the RH trailer tire just comes apart in spectacular fashion. Wife is following along in the chase vehicle & we get over to the side of the highway without incident - luckily. I'd say there is a good chance Michigan drivers are the most uncourteous, worst drivers in the country, but we make it from the fast lane to the RH shoulder.
So a few dilemmas here. The spare on the trailer is one of the original Tracker tires - the boat is a 2000. There is clearly a 360* cracked area plainly visible around where the tread & sidewall transition. What are the odds this tire will stay together for more than a few miles? Well, since we have no choice at this point on the spare goes & we drive 10 more miles into Lansing. My daughter is on the phone making calls to tire shops & nobody has a 15" tire. We finally find a Wal Mart store that has several 15" tires in stock so we go to them. The guys at the shop realize it is for our boat trailer & won't sell me a CAR tire for a TRAILER! Now the boat & trailer maybe weighs 3,000 pounds - perhaps less. I've been pulling the boat around for probably 10 years on the car tires. OK, so one blows today - nothing lasts forever. They 'splain to me that they can't sell me a car tire for a trailer - you know I could sue Wal Mart for billions if they do. I might as well be a million miles from home now, even though I'm only 60 miles away. So now we have NO choice - we have to drive 170 miles on the VERY questionable spare, or go back home & regroup Sunday. So me being the rebel, I say F-it & we keep heading toward our destination. WHAT ARE YOU GONNA DO?
Well, somehow by the grace of God, we make it. Sunday I visit the Ludington Wal Mart & we look at tire options. I ended-up ordering in two 8-ply Carlisle TRAILER TIRES. Nobody in town had any 15" trailer tires on the shelf. Once again - might as well have been on the moon. The Carlisles came in Wed. got them mounted up. *They look like very good, bulletproof tires! But who knows? So, how many years should I go before replacing them? I REALLY don't want to go through the side-of-the-highway exercise again!
