Thread: Caravan tyres

I towed a 5.8mt tinnie up to Fraser Is a few years back, and I could always feel that something wasn't right. The people we were staying with suggested lowering the tyres, and low and behold, a nice ride there after.
We had a lot of gear in the boat as we had 2 adults and 4 kids in the D1. So everything from clothes, Xmas pressies, food and camping gear, all in.
Was a new boat and trailer, with electric brakes, so in excellent condition, and once we had the tyres back down to about 36-38 from memory, it towed and handled like a dream. The tyres were just like regular type car pattern, but I think from memory, LT's.
I'm not sure now, if the bad ride I was feeling was from "bouncing" or not, certainly you always seem to get that see-sawing effect, especially with a single axle.
I've had mates who have pulled leafs out of the sets to try and get them to ride better,, it seemed to work, but then I'm not sure of the long term effects on the springs this would have had.

Being 4 wheel (totally) independent, the coils do get a work out,, My bottle jack with 6" of travel just manages to lift the tyres off the deck, and thats just downwards! The shocks are relatively new(maybe 4 years old?).
We use it a bit,, its just coming up on its second birthday with us and its done around 80 hours on the road,,

Hi Pete, I notice you say width isn't a problem, can you go wider to increase the size, this may help displace heat??

Baz.

if i go up to 195 I increase the OD by 30 and the sidewall by 15,,
14" LT's dont come in that many sizes to play around much.

I run these Bridgestone 213V 205 x 14" on my single axle van with 1650kg over axle. Excellent tyre with good load rating.

613V

i have always used yokahama Light truck tyres 3.5 T was the heaviest VAN. have had the best tyre life strength and grip over the others. always check load ratings as i had pirelli that folded the side walls in half on the highway under load (not a nice feeling) recommended and fitted by a tyre shop. then taken back after a week and replaced. about to fit yokahama's to my caravan van.

Some funny advice here.

Wider? Why? It creates more drag. The last thing you want on a trailer tyre.

Desert Dueller? Why do you need tread? Trailers dont provide drive or steer.

Those Bridgestone 613V are good things.

Almost anything in Light Truck.

The less tread pattern the better as they last longer and provide less drag. The less tread pattern also allows less tread movement and therefore less heat.

A wider tyre will disapate heat better but the down side is you'll need to run it at a lower pressure than a narrower tyre. The end result is the lower pressure will allow the tyre to flex more and create more heat to disapate. The end result is the same.

There is advatanges to running wider tyres for more traction in drive and steer tyres but the wider tyre also requires a softer compound. That's a completely different theory there.

My brother recently bought a camp trailer which came with Mud tyres. He requested that is come with standard LT tyres but they seller only had MT tyres becuase they buy them in bulk and thats what people want. Just becuase they look cool, not becuase they are good for a trailer.

There is a similar thing with mountain bikes having disc brakes. They are over complicated for stopping a few KGs. Motorcycles try and fit brakes of a larger diameter and push bikes are doing the opposite. Why, because disc brakes are cool. There has been a heap of development put into them and now they work very well and better than the old grip the rim style brakes but I have no doubt that if as much development went into the old grip the rim style brakes they would be equally as good and cheaper and simpler. It's pretty simple physics that you have more leverage at the rim than near the centre of the wheel.

Happy Days.

Unless you have some fang dangle axle setup. The standard 45mm square axle has a 1500kg limit. The Federal Ecovan (Federal ECOVAN | Everyday Commercial Use | Light Commercial Tyre) in 185R14C has a 800kg limit.

So unless you have a higher axle limit this is the most you will need. Anything else is just creating more drag and using more fuel.

There is also the issue of increasing unsprung weight and higher rotating mass. I am unsure of how much but I know rotating mass has considerable effect on braking.

The unsprunge weight issue is to do with how much energy can be absobed by the moving object (tyre, wheel, brakes, axle) and then needs to be absobed by the spring (and shock if present) and then redirected back toward the ground. Lighter wheels allow the wheel to move up and down faster.

Happy Days.