Old school travel trailer

Ok well this is a shot in the dark but thought maybe someone on here has some info that can help me.

Well my mom and aunt bought this old 1970 Terry travel trailer off of ebay. The thing is it has no wheels. I was going to have the seller measure the lug pattern for me but I want to make sure it is correct before going to the junkyards. So does anyone know any forums or shops I could call? Or does anyone know off hand.
Here is the trailer http://cgi.ebay.com/ebaymotors/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&item=190255584870#ebayphotohosting Thanks

Good luck with finding any rims. Look at the spare hung on the back. It looks like a 4 wide VW rim.

Looking at the spare tire in one photo, it looks like a peculiar wheel spacing to me. Maybe not, but most of the time you can buy a trailer spare wheel with tire at the usual big boxes.

Worst case, you can probably change out the hubs to get a common pattern.

The lady said that it measures 4" from one hole to the other and 5.5" between opposite holes.

Any cars out there with 4x5.5" lug pattern?

That's the big Fayette or Dayton rim and they aren't super easy to find. Usually they came on an axle that was rated at @5k when new but has since been downrated to 2600#. It uses a huge inner bearing, bigger than 6k axles, and a tiny outer bearing with a 3/4" ID. You pretty much have to cut the stubs off and weld in new ones or swap out the axle entirely to change the hubs and allow for "normal" wheels.

RV net is a good forum to get information: http://www.rv.net/

Ok I was actually wrong. My aunt sent me the wrong dimensions on the wheel pattern.

They told her from the middle of one hole to the middle of the next hole is exactly 9.5"

That sounds like 4 x 13" lug pattern. I am going to check out that rv.net and make a few posts there.

Oldopelguy, are you responding to my earlier measurements or do you just happen to know what that trailer has?

Went over to rv.net and got a response very quickly. It appears it is the old obsolete star pattern.

Apparently if the axle is made by Dexter I can convert it to Ford pattern

RVer said:If Dexter, you can call them and give them the numbers that are on the drums, they will be able to cross over to current axles. My trailer had these and they crossed to 3,500 lb axles, I was able to change the drums to standard Ford 5 on 4.5 pattern.

So hopefully I can find at least one old star pattern wheel at a junkyard or gonna have to flatbed it home.

I just happened to know by looking at the wheel. Been building, breaking, fixing, and modifying trailers for a long time, and that's a distinctive rim. You only have to fight one of those axles once to never want to do it again.

The Dexter hubs have 4 big fins going out to each of the bolt holes, and the rims usually have what looks like a big star cut out of the middle. That rim on the back is for sure a Fayette one though, which shares the same bolt pattern, but unless it was a later replacement then the odds are you have a Fayette axle with it's bad bearing combination.

Someone on here had a camper trailer they turned into a flat bed then added a big box on the back of to haul his race car that had those wheels and was looking to replace them. You might do some digging and see if whoever it was swapped the axles and has any rims still.

The most cost effective option is going to be a new set of hubs and spindles from Northern and some regular Ford or trailer rims if the axle housing is long enough to cut just inside of the welds. Problem is that some of those also had the spring perch as part of the axle stub, so the tube is about 8" too short for modern trailer axles and really isn't any good for anything except a big cheater extender. The next cheapest option would be a new axle with hubs and an extra set of spring perches just in case. If you're up for assembling the whole works, Agri-supply company has the best price I've found on assemble-it-yourself trailer axles, though their shipping is almost expensive to make Northern as good a bet if one is local to you.

Here is another link that has proven very helpful.

http://irv2.infopop.cc/6/ubb.x?a=cfrm&s=8076099152

My aunt has a couple old campers at her house so I went over there to see if the wheels on there would work.

The axle has those fins you were talking about and it looks like the same pattern as the spare in that picture.

Crappy cell phone pic but what you think opel?

Should bolt right on. Take a couple and go fetch.

If the drive's short I'd just take the wheels, but if it's a couple hundred miles I'd pop the center cap off one side and take a whole hub and all with it's bearings, just in case, and check the ones on the trailer before you go anywhere. Maybe take some grease to pack bearings before you bring it home, since you're going to have to do it eventually.

reminds me of when i was living in an old shasta trailer with no water or power for about six months. good luck with that