Tobin

I know this has been battled out over and over, but anyone have a good recomendation for a 235/80 16 tire for my trailer? I don't think I can fit 85% tires, the fender is kind of close in the front.

Thanks,
Tobin

TexasCTD

I recently installed (February) some BF Goodrich Commercial LT tires on my Toyhauler and I couldn't be happier with them. They perform great!

I got them from Discount Tire. You can take your trailer there if you have one close by....and they can mount one up and see what fits the best among the choices available.

http://www.bfgoodrichtires.com/specs...season/45.html

..

roadgeneral

I just went through this with my Toy Hauler. It came standard with ST 225-75R/15 E-rated tires. Fender clearance was tight and I blew one at 55 mph which tore the crap out of the fiberglass fender. At that point I knew I had to go with LT tires instead of the ST tires. Discount Tire worked with me to find the right combo and with some trial and error we ended up with LT 225-75R/16 E-rated tires mounted on new aluminum 16" x 7" wheels with the right offset to fit in the wheel well. Gave me about an 1.5" more ground clearance and maybe 3/4" more width and a much better tire than those STs. Now I'm not constantly thinking about my tires when rolling down the highway. I went with Hankook tires.

vciesielski

I would go with BFG Commercial TA.. Best tire i have used on any trailer so far..

southwestwheel

We carry various manufacturers of the ST23580R16E tire and the only one worth a darn is the Titan. Not all tires are made equally. The ST235 is a true trailer tire and is the only one that can get the 7,000 lbs. rating for a single axle and the 12,000 lbs. rating for a dual wheel axle without going over your psi rating. The problems with tires like the ST22575R15E is they do not make a wheel that can handle the psi. You inflate the tire to max psi and the wheel can not support it. This is not the case with the ST235, it is rated 3500 lbs. single, 3,000 lbs. dual at 80 psi which a standard sixteen inch single or dual wheel can handle. A better alternative than the LT23585R16G which had minimal tread and needed a 110 psi wheels to work.

SundayMoney

Same here. I have about 3000 miles on mine so far this summer. They look good,ride better than the ST tires that were on my fifth wheel,and have a higher speed rating than the STs.

STs are only rated at 65mph,thats the sweet spot for towing with my truck.

I didn't like being right at the speed rating of the tires. No worries with the BFGs now.

roadgeneral

Good advice from SOUTHWESTWHEEL.

The problem is that most of us are not informed enough when shopping around for a trailer. The mistake I made was assuming the trailer manufacturer would have put more thought into the axles/wheels and tires. I know better now, but it took a lot a research and cost me a lot of money in repair bills to finally get it.

How can the manufacturer claim a maximum load rating of 12,800lbs with ST225-75R15E tires on steel wheels? The tires were rated for 2830lbs at 80 psi. That's 11320lbs for all four. They make up the difference by saying the rest of the weight is on the hitch (1480lbs in my case).

My point is..............do your homework before shopping. Don't assume anyone has your safety in mind. Seek out the advice of knowledgeable people.

AlCorr

How to "read" your RV tires to know if they're too old.
By Jan Kuderna





The useful life of a tire is only five to seven years. For cars and trucks driven every day, the tread usually wears out in less than five years. For RVs that sit for a good part of the year, five years can pass with a lot of tread still left on the tire.

Although you may not want to replace what looks like a perfectly good tire, riding on tires more than five years old greatly increases the risk of a blowout.

Date Codes: Every tire has a date code stamped on the sidewall, which gives the date that the tire was manufactured. They look something like this: DOT PDHH MLOR 3403. The date code can be on either side of the tire, so you may have to crawl underneath the rig and look on the inward facing side. The date code always starts with the letters DOT and ends with a 3 or 4 digit number. That last number is the date code, which tells you when the tire was manufactured. The first two numbers indicate the week (out of 52) and the last one or two digits indicate the year. For instance, 3403 means the 34th week of 2003, or the last week in August 2003. Starting with the year 2000, the date codes have two digits for the year, prior to that, only one. A date code of 079 would indicate the seventh week of 1999, or the third week of February 1999.

Tires deteriorate with age, even when sitting on a shelf, so always ask to see the date code when you purchase new tires and insist on tires manufactured within the last few months. The tire dealer may give you a funny look because most consumers don't know about date codes.

Tire Size Designations: That jumble of letters and numbers on the sidewall of the tire is the tire size designation. The first letters indicate the type of tire: P for passenger car, LT for light truck, and ST for special trailer. Bus and medium-duty truck tires have no such designation. The next number is the width of the tire, given in millimeters, followed by a slash. The number following the slash is the ratio of width to section height (only important to tire engineers) followed by a letter: R for radial ply or D for diagonal or bias ply. It ends with a number which gives the inside diameter of the tire in inches. A tire with the designation ST225/75R15 is a special trailer tire that is 225 millimeters wide with a width to section height ratio of 75. It is a radial ply tire that will be mounted on a 15-inch wheel.

Load Range: The load range of a tire is indicated by a letter, A through E, and is stamped on the sidewall of the tire. Tire charts, available from any tire dealer, have these letters in parentheses after some of the tire load limits. The letters are placed next to the maximum weight for that load range.

Which Type of Tire to Use
Tires are engineered specifically for different types of vehicles. Passenger car tires are designed to provide a soft ride and grip the road during turns and adverse weather. Light truck tires have stiffer sidewalls in order to carry heavier loads, but also are engineered for safe handling and road gripping ability. Trailer tires, on the other hand, are designed to give a soft ride and to slide sideways or scrub the road while cornering. Because of these differences, never put light truck tires on a trailer. Some people think that if the tire is good enough for a truck it must be good enough for a trailer, but this is a fallacy. Light truck tires are not engineered for the unique stresses of trailering.

roadgeneral

[QUOTE Because of these differences, never put light truck tires on a trailer. Some people think that if the tire is good enough for a truck it must be good enough for a trailer, but this is a fallacy. Light truck tires are not engineered for the unique stresses of trailering.[/QUOTE]

Here we go again and again.....................You can keep your ST tires!! I'll go with the LT tires EVERY time. In the long run, I will have far less problems with the tires. It is a well known fact...........indisputable!! Check out the many threads here as well as the RV.net forums.

xyzer

I agree a rim can be overloaded with a tire of a higher rating.....but it appears the tires go south wayyyy before the rims without reaching there rating ....Most of us just want a trailer tire that will give us good service with a bit of margin...... When folks start asking who makes a good rim that will last as long as my tires then it is time to step up! Rim failure or blowout..... they both suck!

southwestwheel

Just remember on trailer wheels and trailer tires, there is no regulatory body overseeing the whole mess. A foreign manufacturer can pretty much stamp what ever they want on the side of the rim or tire, who is going to stop them. They sell it to a trailer manufacturer at a cheap price and that is all they care. Happens more than you think.

supr

Hey Darrick-
Please tell us more about Titan tires and your experienece with them. Also, have you had expeience with Denman tires, ST?
From what I have read, LT radials will not tolerate sitting long periods of time that trailers often do. They are said to come apart under these circumstances more quickly.
I have some 16" Taskmaster LT tires on my 18' Utility trailer that have done well so far. This unit mostly goes on long straigh trips, unlike Camping trailers that usually have to make sharp turns to park. It hsa 12k capacity.
I think in general, there seem to be a lot of "Poor" ST tires on the market, perhaps, including the Goodyear Marathon. There may be some good ones out here, but it is tough for most epople to figure it out.

southwestwheel

Titan or www.titandist.com bought the old GoodYear Farm and Rubber division a few years back. Everything is made in the US, their CEO makes sure of that. But in comparisons to other ST tires we have seen an apparent physical diffrence is very noticable. Trust me, we carry the cheap ST235 and you get what you pay for. I have not come accross the Denman as of yet, so I can't comment. Dry rotting is the hardest part of selling trailer tires. The trailers set 98% of their lives no matter how much you tow. 90% of the compaints will come from dry rotting. Their is no good solution for this. Tires have a chemical in them that needs to be bent and flexed to keep its liquidity. This is not a problem with vehicles that are driven everyday.

Bill1374

If lt tires are no good for trailers, then why did my Newmar KountryStar and NuWa Hitchhiker come with Goodyear Wrangler LT tires? Many thousand miles with those rigs with no problems. My BigHorn came with Chinese bombs but now rides on Goodyears.

Bill

southwestwheel

Because they got a good deal!