Long story kinda short. I traveled to LOTW with a friend that turned a 10 hour trip into 18 hours. He had 4 blowouts and had to get 2 bearings put in. He is pulling a 27 foot deck boat that is HEAVY with the tandem trailer that is made for it that has those short, squatty, fat tires that you see on pontoon boat or snow machine trailers. (yeah, I know, YIKES) He had new bearings put in 1 year ago by someone I have taken everything I own to without any problems. the same tire kept blowing out. I carry along one of those lazer thermometers and would check all tires/bearings when we would stop. the front bearings were between 92-98 degrees and the rear were 115ish. The tires were running about 15 degrees hotter respectively. After the third blowout I reached around to the inside of the wheel and it was hot, much more than the bearing was measuring on the outside of the trailer, the tire was at 139 degrees. And no, the trailer brake was not rubbing or locked up. After he spent the night in Moose Lake getting new bearingsput in he made the last half of he trip without any problems. Upon arrival I took the readings and they appeared to be "normal".

On the way back, I was pulling my boat, a Lund 2100 Barron I/O, with 4 peoples stuff and gear in it, with tandem axles and Goodyear Marathons. Also a heavy boat. he had a blowout 10 minutes from the cabin, this time a different tire which I tend to believe was due to debris in the road. we did not want to repeat our trip up so we kept our speed no higher than 63 mph. My bearing readings were 72 degrees front and 83 back, his were 105 front and 128 back. (warmer weather on the trip home) The readings were consistant untill 3/4 of the way back the same bearing that was causing the problems on the way up, which had been replaced, shot up to 139 degrees. No blowouts but we were a little nervous.

Give me your opinions as to what is happening.

Keep in mind that last year he had made the trip trouble free with the same boat, same trailer, same truck, and same load in the boat. (none)

My guess is the axle is bent or bad and is ruining the bearing, although to the nekked eye it looks good.
My suggestion to him is that he makes the short ,squatty, fat tires go away and gets some big boy tires.

He has purchased some new original tires that are 10 ply and is hoping this does the trick, as he does not want to switch out the fenders and all.

If you need more questions answered, feel free to ask. any help will be appreciated. a pit crew person I am not.

BTW, if you see someone along the interstate having problems, PLEASE do what the law states and either GET OVER or at least SLOW DOWN!

Thanks,

John B.O.A.T.

It amazes me how undersized most boat trailers are. The first thing I would do would be to weight the boat+trailer to know where you really stand. 10-ply tires will help with the blowouts, but won't do much for the bearings, and overheating bearings are the cause of many blow-outs.

Bent axles are fairly easy to detect. The tires wear out with funny patterns fast.

You have tandem axles. Make sure your trailers are traveling perfectly LEVEL.

If there is ANY degree of tilt on the trailer,the resulting weight transfer will cause one of the axles to be overloaded and likely cause a blowout.