Recommended tires: Radial or Bias Ply

[KYAvion]

Are the axles on the 34’s rated higher than 3500lbs?

[Razorback]

I had to go back to my notes and to the Bearing and Grease Seal thread I posted..... here's what I was reminded of about our 34W......

"Looks like I have a mixture of Dexter K08-201-90 (5.2K) and K08-201-91 (6K) axles. That would account for the different outer bearings. The current Dexter hub components catalogue doesn't list the 5.2K axle... goes from the 4.4K axle to the 6K."

I noted those Dexter numbers while I had the wheels off.

This document might come in handy to see good service info for each type of axle in one place:

[silverloaf]

I installed load range E radial tires when I made the switch. Although load range D was originally on the trailer, Discount Tire recommended upgrading the load range. They gave me E's for the same price as D's.

[pbsled]

My cart before the horse was wheels. For vanity sake, and for the unsprung weight nod, I went with some 16” airstream aluminum wheels and made a tire choice from there. I am a bit of a tire review and testing fanatic, and I am using the Michelin LTX 225/75 M/S tire, but I think that is sadly discontinued in that size and now replaced by the XPS. Depending on load, the LTX is a nice tire at 50-60 psi, was once easy to find in big shops, and is fairly soft at lower pressures. It is also the brand I run on my truck, but in a 275/75 18.

I have a matching trailer spare, but be advised it doesn’t fit in the rear cargo area and is carried in the bed of my truck. I think these are a pretty good tires, which properly covered and cared for, are up for 7-10 years of use. They will dry rot before the tread wears off I think. $ / mile is on the higher side compared to other options. However, with the shift in production and availability - this is somewhat stale advice for that model.

In principle, I believe that a radial “10 ply” E-rated all season truck tire is a fine choice for a tandem axle trailer in this weight range, but that probably puts comfort and durability ahead of cost.

Clearance is tight but acceptable in this arrangement with my axles, but care and testing is required for sure. Wheel offset is the tricky concern in my case.

[Salty]

I had read somewhere that, due to the live axle of our trailers, radials were not recommended. As I recall, the author had experienced issues and cited other examples on our trailers of radial blow out.
That said, if folks here have 10K+ miles on a set of radials w/o incident, I'd say the gentleman reporting radial issues had other problems.
I know my trailer suffered a drivers side rear blow out, at least twice. I say twice, b/c the sheet metal there had already been changed once and was wrinkled again when I bought it (and since replaced it).Now, whether it was a radial tire in play, I don't know.
I'm gathering that the consensus here is that radial tires are just fine.

[silverloaf]

There are so many variables affecting tire life. This includes heat, suspension geometry, operating conditions, load, maintenance, construction, etc. We hear a lot about failures but little about the conditions that put them into a failure mode.

As impressive as independent suspension might be on an Avion, it's a pretty complex process to keep the wheels square and true to the road. I agonized over this while re-building the adjust-a-ride suspension on our 30P. So many moving parts...so many opportunities to screw things up.

In other words, I would be eager to first know the latent conditions prior to someone's tire failure.

[Markinalaska]

Are the axles on the 34’s rated higher than 3500lbs?

Mine aren’t, I am doing the bearings/brakes/hubs and I have 10” hubs and brakes and a #84 spindle which is rated for 3500 lbs total or 1750 per side. I have the 81 34 V and apparently this model year had all kinds of things a bit different than other 34v’s. Maybe that’s why no one can find the manuals for this year. The company destroyed them all so no one would find out the differences.

[Salty]

Are the axles on the 34’s rated higher than 3500lbs?

The axles on my 34V had the S/N & ratings tags on them still and the rating was 5250.