Tires and Torsion Axles

[krazyk]

For those that were complaining about my strong opinions on tires I will explain. Owning multiple vehicles and trailers over the years, I have been thorugh several brands with good and bad experiences.



All experiences had the same thing in common. Trying to save a buck buying cheap Chinese tires and even some other alleged decent name brands always resulted in eventual replacement with well known, more expensive brands. The most recent examples being:


Tow vehicle. New Atturro tires. Poor stability and crappy road manners. Replaced with BF Goodrich RTA. Lesson learned.


Current TH trailer. Factory installed Castle Rock. Sway, instability, etc. Road manners worsen as they heat up during trip. Replaced with GY Endurance. Pulls like a dream.



By all means buy garbage tires if you want to but you will pay in the end.


On to Torsion Axles: Personal experience mid 2000's. Absolute worst towing experience ever. Poor stability and unpredictable road manners. Will never buy again. Leafs are just a better design for mid to heavy trailers.



Once again, if you love them, good for you. Enjoy. My experience was not fun.


I dont post any opinions without personal experience to back it up so please dont take offense if someone doesnt agree with you.

[Lins]

I’m also not a fan of our torsion axles.

[lisaz]

Well, we've been full time now for 2+ years in our 2014 Rockwood 5er. As we were getting ready to put our last 2 new Goodyear's on the left side, I noticed the welds that secure the mounting brackets to the axles we're cracked, separated, all of them on that side of both axles (torsion axles)!
What if we hadn't seen the cracks??
Should all torsion axle owners have to check welds??
There's nothing bent, no accidents, blowouts or anything that may have caused this.
So, we're not torsion axle fans either!!
Anyone else have broken welds???

[azfansinnc]

You might be right with heavier trailers. However, our 7000# Rockwood's torsion axles have been a dream for the last 3 years and 6-8K miles of towing around the east coast.

Spot on re: the Castle Rocks vs the GY Endurance. The difference in stability was immediately noticeable.

[krazyk]

Its possible weight is the problem with torsion axles. The last one I owned was over 14K GVWR and pulled like crap, even with HD tires and towed with a Ram/Cummins 6 speed manual 3500 DRW. Terrible road manners and caused enough white knuckle issues to prevent me from ever buying another. One time an axle dipped off roadway and caused trailer to damage the truck bed. Terrible design. Leafs are simple, can be easily upgraded, cheap to repair, and parts are much easier to find. Torsions, not so much.