My tires (225/75/15) say 65 max PSI on the side wall. I also have a sicker up near the front of the traler that says tires to be inflated to 65 PSI. The sticker is similar to the yellow sticker found on the door of my truck. It has weight ratings and psi on it. Seems that TT manufactures want the tires at max psi since people load their TT to the max sometimes and thats making all TT's safer. How is the average guy that doesn'tread this site know what the psi is for at any rated load? By maxing out psi it covers all poeple pulling TT's. The guy thats loaded or the guy thats 500lbs under GVW.
It's a no-brainer to inflate the trailer tires to the max rating stamped on the sidewall, when they are cold....if you do that, you have done as much as you can to prevent blowouts by excessive loading..
You might consider a tire pressure monitoring system...my monitor on the dash rotates among the 4 tires, reading out the pressure and temperature...it has a alarm (programable) that sounds if any parameters are exceeded.
I agree with the 55mph suggestion..why take the tires to their max speed limit? There also is a financial incentive in better fuel mileage, somewhere around 10% or more if you drop from 65mph to 55mph.. You might not care a lot about mileage if your trips are short..I do, because my trips are almost always more than 500 miles, and more often around 2000 miles.
"One question I have is while the tires say "maximum 50 psi" is this really the best pressure to be running - using my van for example the tires say "80 psi max" but most people run 50 to 70 psi.
Thanks in advance, Gary"
Air the ST tires on your trailer to the maximum on the sidewall. With max air, your tires will run cooler as well as carry their weight rating at 65mph all day long, assuming a quality tire, sized and ply rated for the task.
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The OP's van at 80psi will be a very rough ride. Passenger vehicle tires are often run at a less-than-maximum pressure for the comfort of the people. Nobody's riding in the trailer (at least they SHOULDN'T BE), so the smooth comfortable ride isn't a concern. Passenger vehicles also have a much more dynamic suspension and the tires are key part of that system. If you run a passenger tire much over or under the recommended pressures, you'll notice a change in how it performs. Having the correct tire pressure in a passenger vehicle will allow the entire tread to be in contact with the road surface. Over inflated causes the center to contact more than the shoulders and results in uneven wear.
Sidebar: Out of desparation/emergency, I had to put a set of S-rated tires on my Subaru Outback (try finding 98H tires in small NW Iowa town the Friday after Thanksgiving!) The car handled so poorly, I thought I'd either wreck or get pulled over as a drunk driver! They got me back to Denver where I replaced the cheap tires with a proper set for the vehicle. The S-rated tires have a much softer sidewall than H-rated, thus it messed up how the suspension worked!
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At max pressure, the tires mave minimum rolling resistance (means best mpg's), highest load capacity, full rated speed (on most st tires that is 65 mph) and best resistance to sidewall damage. You may wear the center of the tires before the edges, but unless you tow the trailer all the time, they will die of old age long before they wear out. For most people 3 or 5 thousand miles a year is alot on the trailer, that is 15 to 25 thousand in 5 years, I have never seen a trailer tire (without axle problems) worn out at 25k.
Oh here we go again with the "inflate based on weight", "ST vs LT", "China Syndrome", "Always go bigger" etc, etc.... I like to keep it simple. No Chinese made tires, always inflate to max, do not exceed 65 mph. After switching to Maxxis I have had zero issues. Problem solved for me.
fla-gypsy wrote: Oh here we go again with the "inflate based on weight", "ST vs LT", "China Syndrome", "Always go bigger" etc, etc.... I like to keep it simple. No Chinese made tires, always inflate to max, do not exceed 65 mph. After switching to Maxxis I have had zero issues. Problem solved for me.
End of story...simple, to the point, intelligent post.
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fla-gypsy wrote: Oh here we go again with the "inflate based on weight", "ST vs LT", "China Syndrome", "Always go bigger" etc, etc.... I like to keep it simple. No Chinese made tires, always inflate to max, do not exceed 65 mph. After switching to Maxxis I have had zero issues. Problem solved for me.
End of story...simple, to the point, intelligent post.
Not the response I get for a lot of my posts (LOL) but thanks!
fla-gypsy wrote: Oh here we go again with the "inflate based on weight", "ST vs LT", "China Syndrome", "Always go bigger" etc, etc.... I like to keep it simple. No Chinese made tires, always inflate to max, do not exceed 65 mph. After switching to Maxxis I have had zero issues. Problem solved for me.
Direct answer to your question though, the correct inflation pressure is stamped on the side wall.
I'll pick a nit here - the correct inflation pressure can only be found on the manufacturer's load and inflation table - the pressure stamped on the sidewall is merely the pressure that must be in the tire to carry the tire's maximum load.
To find the correct inflation pressure you need to take some weight measurements with the trailer loaded for travel. Ideally you want to find the weight carried by each tire, but in a pinch you can weigh each axle and come close. Once you have the weight carried by each tire you go to the manufacturer's table and look for that weight - the table will tell you how much air you need to carry that weight. Most people will then add about 5 psi to the table's figure for a safety factor, so long as it does not exceed the MAX pressure stamped on the tire's sidewall.
One more tip: if you get individual tire weights you need to use the higher weight on a given axle and inflate both tires on that axle to the appropriate pressure.
I agree with above. I use the tables, plus 5 psi for luck. No tire troubles except a few repairable nail punctures in over 200,000 miles on various NON-CHINESE ST tires.
I tend to wear mine out at about 40,000 miles before I hit my personal tire age deadline of 7 years per DOT code.
P.S. All of the trailers I've owned came with stock with tires which were capable of quite a bit more than the trailers GVWR.
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