wheel bearings

[Alan]

your explanation, wonderfully clear though it is puts me in mind to Haines manuals when I was attempting to service & restore my Series 3 Land Rover. It all seems clear enough but what it doesn't say is "the nuts will all be covered in muck, oil and sh*t so you can't recognise anything. They will also be seized solid and no amount of WD40 will shift them. You will curse, the spanner will slip and you'll crack you knuckles. Then you'll REALLY curse. Try again and the bolt shear. Bugger. Now refer to appendix 2 - How to drill out a bolt when its sheared!"

[Jono Garton]

Hi Chaps

The other thing people forget - is to grease the bearings before going in the water. When you have been on a long jurney and the bearings are HOT, just plonking the trailer in salt water is not so good for bearings.

So let them cool down and then grease !!!!

[John Kennett]

1. DO NOT use the handbrake on a trailer, ever. The shoes will stick to the hub (big round cast iron brake thingy) and lock the brakes on. If you are lucky the boat will be on the trailer and lots of power from a 4x4 forwards and backwards will break the bond, if you are lucky.

This can happen even if you don't use the handbrake -- don't know how, it just does!

By all means try just pulling forward to see if it will unstick, but if it doesn't sort itself out quickly don't keep trying. All you'll do is wear a groove in the ground.

If your brakes are stuck on, the best thing is to bite the bullet, dig out your jack, lift the offending wheel, and tap the back of the drum with a hammer/spanner/lump of wood/weight belt. In almost all cases this will unstick it very easily.

John

[wavelength]

Anyone think of anything else ?
Pete

If you re-use a split pin always put a new one in at the earliest opportunity. If the nearside one gives up then castle nut will unscrew itself as the wheel rotates forwards ( the offside one tends to screw itself up. I've seen a couple come off - both nearside and both a few weeks after a bearing had been changed at the roadside.

[Pete7]

John is quite right, they can stick even without the handbrake being on, suspect it might be because we always tend to reverse the boat into a parking or garage. The shoes are only intended to go one way, although Indespension in Southampton managed to put them in the wrong way round on my trailer before I drove to Stranraer

When I remember I must try gently pushing the trailer back and forth a few times at the end of the day to free the shoes off. Unless anyone else has another explanation ?

The Indespension manual is a bible though and well worth the £2 as are there bearing protectors which press grease into the hub.

Oh and if your wondering why don't they make brakes linkages out of something that doesn't corrode, like stainless steel or carbon fibre, well cos its very profitable selling new bits to us every year.

[Rene]

Pete,

your right about the brakes beeing stuck even without using the handbrake..
It's likely to be because we all reverse the trailer into the parking area, and there fore the braking is on, when we leave the trailer.

( I really can't figure out how it works on my new trailer , there is no brakes when the trailer is reversing. But if I slam on the braks all 4 wheels on the trailer come to a complete stand still, so they must be working. Tried this in Copenhagen city, when a moron drove out just in front of me, if it hadn't been for my rib, his car might not have been so pretty afterwards...
I drive a large 4x4 )

There is one workaround on this.... When you have the boat in the right spot, drive a little - very little - but fast forward, this way the brakes releases, and the boat is still in the right spot.. (And don't slam on the brakes afterwards, try it a few times, where there is plenty of space)

Don't try to do this by hand, I don't think it will be enough to release the brakes completly. Unless you are on big ..... (something)

Regards
Rene