Trailer failure on-road

[alcam2001]

I am trying to get to understand the real and specific causes of trailer failure to sperate out the myths. So many aspects of trailer selection, brands, features, setup, maintenance etc is seems to be based on 'theoretical' future problems under freak conditions, while only a very few are actual, real, observed failures.

So comments, please with actual on-road failure of trailers - with the real cause.

NOTE: I am not currently interested in 'driver error' failures (failure to attach safety chains, failure to lockdown hitch etc).

Some (obvious) examples in no particular order to kick this off:
1. axle seize/failure due to corroded bearings
2. overrun brakeline stretch resulting in overheated brakes in tow vehicle (or worse)
3. taillight failure due to hidden corrosion in sockets (but worked before the trip)

Please feel free to add to this list or dispute the above entries.

[sleepygreg]

Brake failure due to pads corroding onto discs, then shearing off spring on actuating arm. Not heard from car when starting off....but becoming evident when brakes dont work. And this was on a boat regularly used (ie. every three or so weeks)

[Mindi]

my real personally experienced failures have both been almost identical. Failure to check wheel bearings before a significant trip after 6-12 months of use....3 hours down the road smoke from a seizing wheel where the inner bearing has seized and destroyed itself after water ingress over time....stupid stupid user error but this sort of bearing failure (operator failure) is the usual thing in my experience. Sure if you buy a crappy trailer and drive on rough roads you can crack welds etc...but bearings are where the action is. Lights corrode if water gets in...maybe the new LED sealed ones with long integrated wires which never get wet where they join are good..? never used them. Override brakes tend to become less effective unless highly maintained and adjusted but dont have catastrophic failures like bearings.

[PADDLES]

clamp bracket bolts vibrating undone. they let the skid under my old tinny drop at one end which punched the other end through the hull ............... bugger

[DarkHorse]

Borrowed my mates quinnie 400 hornet trophy. Spent the day fishing and on the drive home just after moving off looked in the rear mirror to see smoke coming out from the left trailer wheel arch.

The 3 leaf spring had broken through causing the wait of the boat and trailer to come down on the wheel. Had to get the boat and trailer "towed" home on a flatbed truck.

Trailer was 4 years old, never gets washed down and had been off road a few times.

Cost me $170 for a new kit for both sides and about 3 hours of my time, during which he complained about the incident the whole time...........

Will never borrow anything again, and will be hopefully getting my own boat soon.

[trueblue]

Hit the brakes very hard (typically avoiding or in an accident) and the winch post crackes off... Happens when poorly designed, or if the bracket bolts break / or post is corroded and breaks.

Boat launches itself through the back of the towing vehicle.

Design requirement in this situation is a separate safety chain that goes backwards (towards the back of the trailer) to secure the boat in case of winch post failure.

[Dirtysanchez]

On my old boat I had just had the bearings re-done and new bolts in the hub. Drove north to meet some friends and fish Hervey Bay.. didn't get there. 3 out of 4 bolts on one hub, and 2 on the other had sheared off. I was in the middle of nowhere and had to drive to the next town just to get reception and call RACQ.
To this day I still don't know how it happened, the mechanic must have over tightened the bolts ?
Right pain in the arse, I had to wait at Gympie overnight for a shop to open on the Monday to get replacement bolts.

[tenzing]

In addition to the usual brake stories,
I had the bolt through the centre of the snubbing block fracture (or work loose- hard to say as it was gone) and the block dissappeared leaving the gal supports to quietly bite two nice holes in the bow! Not Happy Jan
Brendan

[the gecko]

The first time the bearings went (due to not being checked often enough by me), it was 2am and I drove 4 kms home at walking pace. The Axle hub came out 2-3 inches and had about 1 inch to go before the wheel came right out and falls off. Lucky the deckie walked beside it to yell out if this was gonna happen.

I had the bearings replaced by a mobile mechanic that I knew well.He has full tradesman qualifications. He used marine seals. The bearings failed AGAIN after 3-4 short trips, and so the same thing happened. Drive home at walking pace, for a few kms, bugger me. I got rid of that trailer, no more probs.

Andrew

[finga]

One problem I see a lot is retread tyres letting go or 25 year old tyres letting go.
One poor bugger I helped near Beenleigh had the retreads one whole day before one blew. No spare either until I drove home and picked one up for him.

My mum likes the bad bearings on the trailers at Evans. They're her alarm clock :-/

[tunaticer]

Another one that is often un noticed is internal corrosion of hollow members. Often hot dip galvanizing will miss some internal parts of a trailer unless it is open each end. These corners will look perfectly fine externally until it breaks revealing the internal rust.

All my future trailers will be manufactured from open section members and not RHS or SHS.

Another thing to watch is wobble rollers. They use a washer and a split pin to retain them in place. Sometimes the washer can damage the split pin enough for the washer to jump the pin and the roller to come off leaving a very nasty piece of metal in contact with your hull. I have just been through this exercise on my trailer with a few nice gouges in the ally now.

Jack.

[alcam2001]

Tunaticer, I have wondered about on-road failure of a frame tube due to internal corrosion. Has anyone actually seen one of these happen onroad ? It always seems like one of those things that could happen - I have had to replace badly corroded (inside) cross members - just wondering about the actual catastrophic failure events.

[alcam2001]

trueblue - winch post breakage worries me - hence a turnbuckle/chain tidedown on bow for long trips. But any actual story/witness to this happening catastophically *on the road* ??

[tunaticer]

I've seen several come into the workshop for repairs from internal rust failures. 2 of which the main drawbar failed right where the side members joined the drawbar. It is a main flex point and unfortunately not a good location to get the best internal galvanized job done.

Often times it is a breakage at the rear of the trailer though where it gets dunked with every launch.

Jack.

[wags on the water]

trueblue - winch post breakage worries me - hence a turnbuckle/chain tidedown on bow for long trips. But any actual story/witness to this happening catastophically *on the road* ??


I was hooking the boat up one morning when I noticed the weld was cracked on the winch post. So yes it does happen. A phone call, soon after noticing the break, had a replacement on it's way.

Lucky I noticed it when I did otherwise I could have posted some photos.

[rooboy98]

While living up in the Territory I saw plenty of trailers come to grief. I've seen the drawbars snap on two trailers just behind the towball hitch. One poor bugger I came across was trying to use his wire winch cable to attach his broken drawbar to the rest of the trailer. I offerred him a lift to the next station in the hope they might have a welder on hand but he declined. Good luck with your cable idea I thought as I later drove off down the heavily corrugated dirt track.

My own boat trailer almost came unstuck when the welds holding the spring hanger frames cracked. Basically there was nothing left holding the springs to the trailer frame and I just happened to notice it in time. Gotta be lucky some times I suppose.

[Mike Delisser]

Check it out
http://www.ausfish.com.au/vforum/showthread.php?t=141006

[ovakil]

I had a U-bolt holding leaf springs snapped when I was putting trailer in the water to retrieve boat.It happened at low tide & thought I had fallen off the ramp,loaded boat boat on locked hubs in 4wd,drove up ramp slowly,wife runs up shouting smoke coming out.The tires were scraping mudguard,had to get it up slowly.Lucky it was in a secure car park,came back next day fixed it.Following weekend replaced all u-bolts & bolts I was pi$$ed off at first,then thought how lucky I was it didn't happen on the freeway.
Cheers

[Spaniard_King]

On my old boat I had just had the bearings re-done and new bolts in the hub. Drove north to meet some friends and fish Hervey Bay.. didn't get there. 3 out of 4 bolts on one hub, and 2 on the other had sheared off. I was in the middle of nowhere and had to drive to the next town just to get reception and call RACQ.
To this day I still don't know how it happened, the mechanic must have over tightened the bolts ?
Right pain in the arse, I had to wait at Gympie overnight for a shop to open on the Monday to get replacement bolts.

Thats a clasic description of a loose trailer wheel.. the wheel will wobble when loose working the stud one way then the other.. eventually snapping them.

[oldboot]

There is a myth going arround that certain size wheels/ tyres/ bearings are not rated for highway speeds.

I was fed this one by a bloke selling trailer parts once..... so i went into mythbuster mode.

I rang the,
wheel manufacture
a bearing manufacturer
a lubricant manufacturer
and asked some hard ( not all that hard) questions of the various technical people.

The answer is basicly if the wheels or tyres are rated for legal road use they should be fine at 100 or 110 Kmh...... assuming they are in good condition and properly maintained.

And there in lies the problem.
Corrosion and water ( salt or otherwise) take their toll on all those components including the lubricants.....seesm the single most important thing is the bearings followed by the wheels & tyres.

I looked at the ratings of some of the wheels and tyres.... on some boat and trailer combinations there isn't all that much safety margin in the wheels and tyres.
combine that with some age or corrosion damage and things fail.

I think one of the problems too is that we don't hear or feel the problem hapening on trailers... particulary boat trailers for one reason or another.

I had a tyre fail......it was fine when I left home, it was fine (i think )at the ramp. but by the time I got back into the driveway it was well flat and rolling off the rim.
I did not hear or feel a thing.
Said tyre had been sat well under inflated for a year or more.... possibly the problem.

It is a well known problem that old tyres fail particularly if they are left deflated or underinflated under load or even left stationary for very long periods.

when I pulled the remnants of the tyre off there was quite a bit of corrosion inside the rim. not bad in this case but I can see how rims can fail and look just fine from the outside.

Trailer coplings also have been known to fail with wear....these pull up type couplings do not tolerate wear anywhere near as well as the old screw down types.......A mate lost his trailer this way....it all seemed fine and firm....till he hit a large bump going thru an intersection and then thhump bang and the trailer was making its own way.
The safety chain was welded under the drawbar.... that ground tru on the road in a matter of meters.

It is interesting how few trailers when coupled meet the specification......" the safety chain will not allow the drawbar to strike the ground" or words to that effect.

Oh and those shackles.......if they are common or garden hardware shackles, they have NO load rating..... and you need a much bigger shackle that most people think.....the shackle should be rated at least the weight of the trailer.. some would say twice the weight of the trailer.....if the shackle isnt stamped it isnt rated.

I know another bloke lost his trailer comming across the story bridge many years ago....coupling let go and the shackle broke on the safety chain....yeh great.

seems some people simply do not take their trailer seriously.

cheers

[Dirtysanchez]

How about simply the trailer being under gunned ?
I was on the gateway motorway this morning, and admiring a nice 5.4mtr bow rider (ally) next to me being towed along by a ute belonging to a large boat retailer.. Anyway his lane was doing better than mine so he ended up ahead. It was then I noticed the piss ant little trailer that the boat was sitting on. I have a similar trailer on my 3.6 mtr Jurassic park tinny.. What the ??

It had those garbage little wheels on there, I dunno, maybe 12"
It really did not look up to the task.

[Moonlighter]

Winch Post Snap off
I've seen the winch post snap off as was described earlier - not my boat but one of the boys in our team - admittedly it was on the track across Indian Head at Fraser Island so lots of bumps and stress on the trailers. The cause - no doubt: no safety chain and turnbuckle stopping the boat from moving forwards on the trailer. Should be mandatory in my opinion.

Low Tyre Pressure
My own bad experiences have all been tyres. I'm very careful about tyre pressures, check them regularly so do not believe that was a cause in these cases. Often amazed to see friends tyres with obvious under-inflation in light truck tyres - the standard 32psi is just not enough in those tyres! Most of them say something closer to 50 or 60 pis max pressure and run much better closer to that than they do at 30psi.

Cr*p Tyres
Firstly, the Dunbier trailer came new with some "Duro" made in China rubbish on them. Lasted less than 12 months - was checking the bearings before a long trip and spun the wheels - shocked to see tyres didn't seem round, closer inspection the tread near the middle was higher than at the edges. Took to a tyre expert - tread separation diagnosed. Tyres cactus. Just as well I checked....

Then I've blown 2 tyres out on the highway. Both were steel belted light truck radials of well known quality brands and pressures checked regularly. But I will admit that they came from that mob that sells imported used tyres - never again! The issue may well be age of these imported second hand tyres, although they had near 95% tread, who knows how old they were?

Now run quality local brand. No dramas since then. Touch wood!

Broken Override Brake Spring
Yep, seen that one first hand on a mates boat trailer when we were heading to Sunshine Coast up the highway - start to smell hot brakes, then smoke from LHS wheel. The end of the return spring had broken off on one caliper, spring just hanging there meaning that the brake was "on" all the time.

Managed to re-rig the spring by opening out the end of the coil and re-attaching it to the caliper, but then the spring on the LHS caliper was tighter than the RHS one so then the RHS brake was dragging - bugger! Ended up disconnecting the lot so we had no brakes on the boat trailer all the way back to Capalaba.

Phew!

Grant

[oldboot]

I can remember quietly driving down the road in my van ( not a quiet ride) and being passed by a dual cab ute towing a jet ski on a trailer....one of the bearings was squeeeeeeling like a stuck pig........how could you not hear that?

cheers

[matmuller85]

Owning a mobile trailer repair business in townsville i have seen alot of preventable break downs and some not. The biggest thing with boat trailers in salt water gets into everything. break pads swell, copper wires corode, tyres perish quicker salt drys rubber, warm bearing suck cold water in, stailess steel and cast corrode together. no matter what you do you will never win. All you can do is do regular maintenance and protect everything possible with tectyle or fish oil.

[Bros]

Cr*p Tyres
Firstly, the Dunbier trailer came new with some "Duro" made in China rubbish on them. Lasted less than 12 months - was checking the bearings before a long trip and spun the wheels - shocked to see tyres didn't seem round, closer inspection the tread near the middle was higher than at the edges. Took to a tyre expert - tread separation diagnosed. Tyres cactus. Just as well I checked....

Then I've blown 2 tyres out on the highway. Both were steel belted light truck radials of well known quality brands and pressures checked regularly. But I will admit that they came from that mob that sells imported used tyres - never again! The issue may well be age of these imported second hand tyres, although they had near 95% tread, who knows how old they were?

Now run quality local brand. No dramas since then. Touch wood!

The best tyres only have a 5 to 6 year life from brand new so tread depth is no indicator of tyre condition. If you just use then around town at 60k older tyres perform fine its when they are under stress at highway speed they fail.
All tyres have the month and year of manufacturer on the side wall. Tyres made this month will have 1108 on the side wall. I'm not sure weather that applies to the wheel barrow size tyres used on trailers.

[Noelm]

I can remember quietly driving down the road in my van ( not a quiet ride) and being passed by a dual cab ute towing a jet ski on a trailer....one of the bearings was squeeeeeeling like a stuck pig........how could you not hear that?

cheers
Funny thing that, way back (in the good old days) my mate and I were towing his 19' on a dual wheel trailer, his old Landcruiser was a noisey beast at the best of times, when we got home from our trip down the Coast one wheel was missing and the hub had worn down to the axle, never knew anything about it untill he slowed down near his driveway! Christ knows how long it had been dragging along, and guess what? not one car that overtook us gave us a horn blast or a yell or anything, made a doosey of a line on the Road though.

[bayfisher]

It is interesting how few trailers when coupled meet the specification......" the safety chain will not allow the drawbar to strike the ground" or words to that effect.


Unfortunately there doesn't seem to be a standard for where the chain has to be shackled to the car and it seems almost every car has a different place to put the shackle on, In fact on some utes with tray backs this can be a very long way from the hitch (hence requiring plenty of chain) it would make it almost impossible on these vehicles to have the draw bar not hit the ground if the trailer became unhitched. Most manufactures supply a long amount of safety chain so that the trailer can be towed by any vehicle. What most people don't realise is that the shackle doesn't have to go on the last link of chain, each vehicle is different but you can generally pick a link in the chain that will have enough play to let the trailer be maneuverable but will keep the draw bar off the ground in case it becomes unhitched.

Cheers Chris

[oldboot]

Yeh you can put the shackle somewhere else than in the end of the chain.....unless of course someone has been conciencious and used rater short link chain, then the only place you can put the shackle is in the last link.

Facilities for attaching shackles on the tow bars is an issue also.....so many of them this is just a hole drilled in a plate...... quite often the position of this hole presents a very poor load angle that would badly compromise the strength of the shackle.....and you mught have to use two shackles just to get an attachment.

cheers

[Steboe]

Tubeless tyres are much better than tube type, the problem with tubes is water gets in around the valve stem

Ken

[oldboot]

The problem is that some of the cheaper alloy wheels that are common on trailers will not take a tubless valve stem.

cheers

[Moonlighter]

All tyres have the month and year of manufacturer on the side wall. Tyres made this month will have 1108 on the side wall. I'm not sure weather that applies to the wheel barrow size tyres used on trailers.

Yes, agree that's correct on all new tyres made for sale in Australia, but I recall that these used imports didn't even has the max load/pressure marked on them, and probably not the date of manuf either! My advice is to steer well clear of them.

Youre also correct re the age issue - a mate owns a Bob Jane T-mart and said the same thing - 5 or 6 years old and any tyre is suss, but going in and out of the salt water they last even less.

Remembered another couple of "real life" trailer issues as well:

Brake Cable rusted and broken:
Several of us travelling in convoy up to the sunny coast, stopped to fuel up at garage and mates boat had brake cable hanging out from underneath - rusted thru and broke, dragging along road all the way, nice iron filings all along his nice glass hull... maintenance issue as someone said earlier.

Trailer lights guts fell out:
On the corrugated road to Bullock Pt at Rainbow beach, towed my boat which then had the std "bell" type marine lights fitted. By the time we got back to Rainbow camping ground, the guts of the lights were hanging out, things shorting madly and blew fuses in the car left right and centre!

Fixed them up at the time, but now have decent quality LED's and no probs with them so far including a trip to Orchid beach and back.

Grant

[tenzing]

Towing the victory back from scarborough the other night and had to pull up quickly at the lights at northlakes.
Felt a heavy bump from behind so pulled up to take a look.
The winch post had slid forward about 50 cm (only stopping when it came into contact with the jockey wheel clamp).
The boat had slid forward off the rear rollers which had caused the hinged rear section of the trailer to pivot downwards so the rear rollers were up above the bottom of the hull. The turnbuckle that acted as secondary retention had snapped the welded bracket clean off the trailer.
Luckily the rollers missed the trim tabs , the tranny , and the live tank pickup.
I had to use a wheel brace to pinch up the u bolts on the winch post, and head very cautiously off to pine rivers to float the boat off the sunken trailer, then move the winch post back before going home.
No harm done but some wasted time and VERY VERY lucky it didnt happen at speed on the highway. EVERY nut and bolt has since been checked and a review of spanner sizes in the tool kit.
Brendan

[banksmister]

Here is an easy fix when your trailer breaks
drive up to a power pole at about 60 kph and hit dead smack in to middle
note may take some time to perfect

[GAD]

Well I have had a few up trailer problems up the cape now, broken axle one trip fixed it by cobb and coing it together with wire and logs and tape and rope was a mess especially since it was 2.30 am when she snapped on a particuarlly bull dust pothole infested section of track to 12 mile in lakefield.
A broken draw bar on mates boat trailer also wire rope and branches .
Lost a wheel and hub going through to rock point, towed it in to the fishing spot stayed for 9 days and towed it back to cooktown , just stopped and got lenghts of wood every so often tied it up and dragged it on the end of the stump till she wore out or broke slow trip but got there , can't leave anything up there on the side of the road or it will be cactus before you get back.
Watched me mates mudguards fall off on shale before Laura , now it is almost all black top, till Laura and even a bit to Coen now , I can still remember driving into lakeland on dirt now it is sealed all the way to cooktown , one trip there was a guard off a falcon in the middle of the road , few k's later the other guard and a few k's later the bonnet , found this bloke a few k's short the Annan gearbox had dropped out.
I got home from a trip to Taylors beach late one night and in the morning found the wheel laying on the groung next to the trailer next door neighbour had picked it up from his front lawn it had come off as I turned in the driveway I suspect cause there was no guts to the hub it was still bolted to the wheel, bloody lucky I reckon
I had to help a bloke whose aluminium trailer had broke sheared off the part where the coupling hitch is bolted on to the trailer .

Yeah I have had few trailer failures , and seen a few ,I believe in bearing buddys and maintenance but even they aren't always enough salt water and age kill every thing

[Reef_fisher]

Very interesting post, never had any failures (yet) check trailer regularily, even had to rebuild it (springs, bearings, reconfigure boat supports, new winch etc) 2 years ago. Like some have said, maintenance is key, nothing lasts forever, although my trailer is 13years old now and is often dunked in the briny stuff.

[oldboot]

Take a close look at that picture 3 post back.

looks like a litany of woes

the drawbar seems broken.... cant see the remains of any tie downs.....did the boat get on the car before or after it hit the pole.

Hmmm.......I think he needs a suspension upgrade and better roof racks.

cheers

[FNQCairns]

Unfortunately there doesn't seem to be a standard for where the chain has to be shackled to the car and it seems almost every car has a different place to put the shackle on, In fact on some utes with tray backs this can be a very long way from the hitch (hence requiring plenty of chain) it would make it almost impossible on these vehicles to have the draw bar not hit the ground if the trailer became unhitched. Most manufactures supply a long amount of safety chain so that the trailer can be towed by any vehicle. What most people don't realise is that the shackle doesn't have to go on the last link of chain, each vehicle is different but you can generally pick a link in the chain that will have enough play to let the trailer be maneuverable but will keep the draw bar off the ground in case it becomes unhitched.

Cheers Chris

I have a standard hayman reece and there is no way I can shackle it to stay above the ground if it came off, bothers me every single time I hitch it. I have some planned maitenence comming up this winter might weld a skid pad to the trailer then.

cheers fnq

[Goldfinch]

I had an interesting break lockup situation on the gateway a couple of weeks ago. Had just gone through the etoll on the bridge and the trailer breaks locked up on me and brought me to a standstill with a massive semi about to destroy my 7m load from behind. I saw masses of smoke coming from the left side trailer wheels and asked my mate to quickly jump out and pull the cable from the ute. This freed up the brakes and allowed me to get off the gateway at the first exit. After much stuffing around and diagnosing it appears that water had got into the Hydraulic Brake control box on the trailer and shorted the circuit board causing an intermittent fault. I had 2 sparky's test the whole setup and it tested fine. Then I would test it and it was faulty. I took it to the supplier of the unit and he opened it to find about 100ml's of water in it and some burns on the circuit board. I had already replaced the unit 6 months earlier as a warranty repair but the unit was obviously tampered with and not sealed correctly. Almost lost $100K worth of rig thanks to some idiots tampering. Cost me $350 to find the problem without voiding warranty. Very P****d off.

The dealer that I brought the boat and trailer from told me they had done a full service on the trailer, which I paid for. Then 3 months later I had to replace 4 bearing, hubs and an axel, not too mention repair the break setup, lights and winch. Previous owner did not look after it at all.

[whiteman]

Tyres. Had Hancooks or something like that. 2 years on the trailer mainly stored in a shed in tropical NQ. Take the boat into TSV for a service and one tyre blew to smithers. Got it fixed and the dealer said "when one goes, the other's not far behind". Way home ... the other blows.

... and always having trouble with tubeless tyres getting sand and corrosion slow leaks.

[zigfreed]

A picture says a thousand words.............i did::)
Bearing 1 week old