Trailer tires or not

As the race season is approaching I have all but forgotten about my old trailer, the other day,while looking it over I decided the lights and wiring would need to be replaced as the system has been patched together for the last few years and it is just beat.

Then the tires caught my eye ,as I have never done much past putting air in them over the years and have only had one fail (walked right off the wheel) anyway they are not bad looking but may need to be replaced this summer. My question is could I use just regular car tires ? or should I buy trailer tires, the trailer tires are more money and I am only carrying small cars. I think the tires on the trailer are overkill as they are "E" load.

A quick search shows most 14" tires (same wheel size) will hold about 1,000 to 1,400 pounds , The trailer might weigh 1,000 pounds and say a car (heavy) weighs 3,000 pounds that works out to be about 1,000 pounds of load for each tire. Right? if so I cannot see any reason the car tires will not make a good replacement.(Add 20% failure rate? 1,200 pond tire)

Anyone ever done this before or am I missing something? this is the first time I have ever had to replace tires on a trailer so I am not sure.

BTW: this is a two axle dove tail trailer open deck steel.

Paul B

There is a reason for trailer specific tires, but I have always used car tires, and never had a problem. Mine is also a dual axle car trailer.

The main reason (E load tire) would be in case some tool would over load the trailer. Not that anyone would ever do that

Paul B

I've hauled a few LWB crew cabs hundreds of miles on a 2500 lb trailer on passenger tires. It's probably not ideal, but it was fine. I can't justify putting new tires on a trailer. The failure rate is too high. I've gotten several nails in the sidewalls. The rears seem to pick up everything in the road then get low and explode. I use the closest thing to matched sizes I can come up with and carry a spare.

Buy the trailer tires. The passenger car tire sidewalls don't take kindly to towing loads for long periods of time.

Case in point:

This:

From this:

It was luck that it popped after I had gotten home. BTW, lifting 8k# sucks on sandy ground......

My car hauler had regular truck tires on it. I hauled a 3K lb Esprit on it 1800 miles, and it has hauled a 1 ton Dually before I bought it. I was getting the trailer ready to pick up an engine for the Europa (thanks, again, oldopelguy) one day and while airing up the tires, saw steel belts. I replaced them with genuine trailer tires from Walmart.

I've had a 2 axel trailer for over 15 years and never had a tire failure! OK, just once but the trailer was parked in storage and it was the spare tire that failed. What kills tires used on trailers if the SUN!. The spare tire that failed just blew out while in storage. The top of that tire was exposed to the sun 7 days a week, 365 days a year which caused it to fail. The other tires which are covered by the fenders are not a problem. I do replace the tires every 6-7 years, long before they wear out! I have used LT tries on my trailer as well as passenger car tires. I currently have a pair of LT tires and a pair of trailer tires on it. The rims are 14 inch.

If you match the load capacity of the tire to the trailers capacity and don't exceed it then you should not have a failure. My trail is rated to 7000 lbs gross, trailer + load. The tires are all rated at 2000 lb or higher.

I use car tires on my trailer. The car and trailer weigh less than a car the tires would have been mounted on.

my thought here, specific to your description is that a regular 14" tire is not likely to be good enough. yes in an ideal world each tire will take 1000 pounds, but reality is different and turns, hills, rapid changes in grade etc will bias the weight to one side or one axle on a regular basis. if you are hauling a car, i think the tires on the trailer should be better than the tires on the car load wise since you are adding a significant amount of weight (the trailer) to the same number of tires (car =4, trailer =4) just my $.02

Trailer tires! With twin axle in hard turns the tires have to scub and slide you need stiff sidewalls that will not be damaged to do this over and over again. Place like E-trailer and trailer parts supper store sell them on rims for about $20 more then just the tire! Winter is the best time to find deals and both meet of beat the other so play the game.... 44

Generically, trailer tires have stiffer sidewalls. Makes them less prone to wiggling and wagging the dog when towing. That makes for a better tow.

Can you tow with car tires on a trailer? Sure. Lots of us have and do. Air them up and you're good to go. Just, not quite as good to go as you would be with real trailer tires.

Trailer tires man, you wouldn't run a race with snow and ice tires, use the tires built for the job

Buy the trailer tires. Sure passenger car tires will fit the trailer wheels. You can also drive your car with a gas tank strapped to the passenger seat with bungee cords-doesn't mean you should.

Ok you guys have sold me on the trailer tires. I will look in to them this week.

Thanks for all the input guys.

Paul B

I guess this thread is over but id just like to say: I HATE trailer tires. They seem to like to fail no matter how you treat them. Im all for putting a 15 or 16 inch car tire on a trailer, but if you have 13 or 14" wheels, the car tires for those wheels are usually underbuilt for the job. You can get a 15" tire to hold anything. Switching wheels to facilitate this is an option..

foxtrapper wrote: Generically, trailer tires have stiffer sidewalls. Makes them less prone to wiggling and wagging the dog when towing. That makes for a better tow. Can you tow with car tires on a trailer? Sure. Lots of us have and do. Air them up and you're good to go. Just, not quite as good to go as you would be with real trailer tires.

I have an RV trailer that is sprung fairly softly. When I got it, it had soft mushy 15" car tires on it. I replaced them due to weather cracking with proper trailer tires. I was amazed how much better it towed with trailer tires on it. Especially in cross winds.

i read somewhere once that a passenger or LT tire on a trailer application loses about 35% of load rating due to the different forces involved in trailer tire applications.

aussiesmg wrote: Trailer tires man, you wouldn't run a race with snow and ice tires, use the tires built for the job

+1

Strizzo I have not hear of this as 35% seems kind of high to me , I did add 20% failure rate in and could still find tires in that load range.

Strizzo wrote: i read somewhere once that a passenger or LT tire on a trailer application loses about 35% of load rating due to the different forces involved in trailer tire applications.

I am pleased with how straight the trailer tracks and I do not want to lose that feature.

    aussiesmg wrote
    Trailer tires man, you wouldn't run a race with snow and ice tires, use the tires built for the job

As a matter of fact my Firestone Winter-forces showed up today and I cannot wait to use them in about two weeks.

Paul B

This might be a good article for some magazine somewhere.

Paul B

I was actually thinking about putting truck tires with Load Range E on my trailers. It seems like trailer tires are kinda cheaply made and are expected to fail after a couple years. I have used car tires before and that trailer LOVED to wag its tail if it wasn't loaded really heavy toward the front. I was thinking that if I got a set of HD truck tires, my rims are 16", they would be built better than the trailer tires. Has anyone ever run the "E" rated tires on their trailers?