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Commercial Trailer Tires, Wheels and a Few Other Things

Want to know about Commercial trailer tires wheels?

This article is mainly about commercial trailer tires, wheels and a few extra tips. Your commercial trailer tires will wear slower than other tires for a few simple reasons.

Steer and drive tires wear fastest. Trailer tires are not subject to the sorts of forces needed to change the direction of a heavy truck on the move. Engine torque also exacerbates tire wear, so a trailer tire has these advantages in its corner.

There are some disadvantages for commercial trailer tires. Wheels with a shallow rib design tend to fair better than deeper treads, but all trailer tires can suffer from irregular wear patterns. Do not go for a deeper tread unless you are getting good results with constant, regular wear patterns.

Deeper treads may also generate severe turning side forces. Increasing internal stresses may result in increased numbers of problems, like belt separations for example.

Reducing Costs

As I said in the article on commercial tires,  commercial tires are an integral part of a business. Things are getting tighter and tighter in the transport game, so you always need to be looking at continuous improvement.

One of the ways you can reduce costs and improve results from your tires is by moving the steer and drive tires back to the trailer as they wear. It is becoming commonplace and it works. The alternative is to retread them.

Retreadability is something everyone keeps in mind, some fleets run nothing but retreads on their trailers and get fantastic results with them. Regular inspection of tires will detect future problems so that corrective action can be taken. To further extend wear and enhance retreadability, tires can be pulled earlier rather than later.

A tire with shallow tread is more vulnerable to road hazards and punctures. These can render it unretreadable, so think of it as collateral damage when you pull them off for retreading.

If you work off-road, even if it is only very rare, consider tires designed for both on and off highway service. Off-road work can be particularly harsh on tires that are not designed with this use in mind.

Proper Maintenance

Checking inflation pressure is the key, by maintaining correct tire pressure, optimum fuel economy and maximum retreadability can be achieved. This, combined with minimal wear and tear, reduces tire costs per mile to an absolute minimum.

Wheels under these trailers have to support huge loads and inflation pressures are often varied to support different loads. Sometimes you may have to upgrade tires for specific loads. Be wary of over inflating tires, if you need to increase inflation pressure make sure the tire is rated to take the air pressure.

Look after you trailer tires. Wheels generate enormous heat and this can be amplified by incorrect pressures. If you make sure your tires keep their cool, so will the boss when the tire bill comes around.

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