Carlisle Trailer Tires

[HalfFish5087]

Gents, I have a 226 Larson (3K dry weight) on a tandem roadrunner trailer with ST205/75 D14 tires. According to the previous owner these were bought new about 8 months ago and the condition of the tires appears to reflect this. The tires may have 1,000 miles on them with no cracking, bubbles or any other abnormalities.

Before leaving out this weekend I checked pressure and put all tires at 45 psi. The tires do note 50 psi cold. Here comes the good part, after about the first 5 miles (maybe 15 miles of total travel on the return trip) on the interstate doing 60 ? 65 mph, the left rear tire suffered a blow out leaving some carnage on the wheel well and taking a side bunk with it. I had a spare so the day wasn?t spent on the side of the road and luckily no other cars where close at the time of the blow out. The rear axle is my braking axle and I checked to see the wheel was overly hot and it was warm, but did not appear to be excessive.

I did a quick search and it appears that many others have not had great success with this brand of tire. Can anyone comment on the quality of these tires? Should I have not put 45 psi of pressure in the braking tires since they do heat up more than the non-braking tires? I?m not sure what the tire load rating is, but I will be checking it tonight to make sure I?m not exceeding it. Thanks ahead for any responses.

 

[oldjeep]

Re: Carlisle Trailer Tires

Opinions will vary, but my .02 is that you should have had 50psi in the tires. I've had some carslisle tires in the past and didn't find them any worse than others but some say they are worse.

From your picture it looks like the sidewall was rubbing on the fender.

 

[nate1220]

Re: Carlisle Trailer Tires

I used to work for a tire shop that was a carisle dealer. I run carisle on all of my trailers. I love their tires. If you read the DOT you can figure out the actual age of the tire. Just because they were bought a few months ago doesn't mean the tire isn't a few years old.

 

[HalfFish5087]

Re: Carlisle Trailer Tires

If you read the DOT you can figure out the actual age of the tire.

Seaman, specifically what do you mean here? Can I post a pic and you tell me the age?

 

[HalfFish5087]

Re: Carlisle Trailer Tires

From your picture it looks like the sidewall was rubbing on the fender.

oldjeep, Thats what I thought at first glance, but there is at least 4 inches between the fender and tire.

 

[nate1220]

Re: Carlisle Trailer Tires

If you can post a pic with enough detail I can.

 

[HalfFish5087]

Re: Carlisle Trailer Tires



Seaman, this is the only one I have on me now. Let me know if it has the detail you are looking for. Thanks!

 

[Scott Danforth]

Re: Carlisle Trailer Tires

1000 miles can be a lot, or not much at all. if you do a lot of tight backing/turning, etc. then your skidding two of the wheels every time you turn. I used to change the rear axle tires once a year on the searay's shoreland'r trailer because I was cording the tires with the tight turning I had to do to get the boat in the garage. I usually caught the tires when the tread started to get distorted, however not always.

its hard to tell, however sometimes tires fail from underinflation, some times from cord separation, some times from road debris.

 

[H20Rat]

Re: Carlisle Trailer Tires

My guess is that you may have picked up some debris/nail and ended up with a flat tire. On a tandem trailer you won't notice a problem until you see chunks of rubber flying up in the mirror. (on a single you would have felt a flat tire)

 

[oldjeep]

Re: Carlisle Trailer Tires

Tire in that picture looks low - how much pressure is in that one? You have to be really carefull on tandems, when you are making a tight turn you can easily damage/ shred underinflated tires due to sidewall flex

 

[bigdee]

Re: Carlisle Trailer Tires

Can you post the D.O.T. Info? Also tires should always be inflated to max. People seem to be paranoid about this but tires are not balloons, they need to be rigid to be safe.....flex on trailer tires is not good. True,tires may heat up from various factors and increase pressure above max but this is normal. The specs on the sidewall are for cold tires.

 

[royal0014]

Re: Carlisle Trailer Tires

My guess is that you may have picked up some debris/nail and ended up with a flat tire. On a tandem trailer you won't notice a problem until you see chunks of rubber flying up in the mirror. (on a single you would have felt a flat tire)

This ^^ is my thoughts. Can you see the trailer wheels in your rearviews? And how often do you look?


<<)))(((>>

 

[HalfFish5087]

Re: Carlisle Trailer Tires

Know that I think about it, the boat did seem to pull a little heavier when I pulled onto the interstate and I'm guessing that smokingcrater is correct in that I did likely picked up something and the tire went flat before becoming a road gator.

I do try and check the tires in the mirrors every few minutes, but of course I can only see the front set so...

Thanks for all the responses and I will still try and post the DOT info tonight.

 

[oldjeep]

Re: Carlisle Trailer Tires

Thanks for all the responses and I will still try and post the DOT info tonight.

ST205/75 D14 would normally be 1760lbs at 50psi (x4 = 7K total) Highly doubtful that he is overloaded.

 

[royal0014]

Re: Carlisle Trailer Tires

Know that I think about it, the boat did seem to pull a little heavier when I pulled onto the interstate and I'm guessing that smokingcrater is correct in that I did likely picked up something and the tire went flat before becoming a road gator.

I do try and check the tires in the mirrors every few minutes, but of course I can only see the front set so...

Thanks for all the responses and I will still try and post the DOT info tonight.

Yep, there's your clue. Make sure you double-check the wheel bearing where that tire was.

 

[greekfreek]

Re: Carlisle Trailer Tires

50Lbs is correct. However a rep from EZ Loader stated to me that "Carlisle recommends when going 66 to 75mph that the inflation should be increased by 10lbs. I could not fine this anywhere on the Carlisle web site and I sent them an Email, no answer as of yet...

 

[kenmyfam]

Re: Carlisle Trailer Tires

I am thinking they should be at 50 psi cold to begin with. Would take out some of the "if's" in the diagnosis.

 

[greekfreek]

Re: Carlisle Trailer Tires

Well Carlisle responded to my question of tire pressure at speeds 66 to 75 mph. "The pressure should be set to whatever is on the sidewall" So thanks EZ Loader for wrong info.

 

[dingbat]

Re: Carlisle Trailer Tires

Well Carlisle responded to my question of tire pressure at speeds 66 to 75 mph. "The pressure should be set to whatever is on the sidewall" So thanks EZ Loader for wrong info.

Interesting, seeing that all "ST" tires have a maximum speed rating of 65 mph

 

[Al Kungel]

Re: Carlisle Trailer Tires

To check the age of your tires, go here.
http://www.tirerack.com/tires/tiretech/techpage.jsp?techid=11