Boat Trip - One of those days! Advice is do the maintenance on the boat trailer.
Submitted: Saturday, Apr 04, 2009 at 17:37
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Member - Tony B (Malanda FNQ)
Ever driven past a broken down boat trailer (any trailer though) and thought, they should have looked after that better? I have and...
well yesterdays fishing trip was a bit delayed.
We get up at 3am as it is 1.25hrs down to the coast from the
Atherton Tablelands. We had towed the boat to
Cooktown 2 weeks ago and all was OK! I have bearing buddies, renewed the bearings & brakes not long ago - should still be good! 1 hr in to the trip turning a corner in South Johnston and thump & bang and then a grinding stop. Wheel was over the other side of the road with the brake drum glowing red hot. On inspection the stub axle was also glowing red and bent up at 45 Deg. (luck we were at low speed I would say)Thing is I though you would hear or feel this all happening - I can now tell you that,
well you can always. We had our windows down and were listing to the radio, but as far as noises of the pending catastrophe - we heard none!
Cut a long story short - I got it off to the edge of the road and after a lot of jacking and going to
Innisfail to get parts we got it rolling again at 1pm - Went to the reef - caught some great fish and got back
home by 830pm.
So if you have a trailer, even more if it is a boat trailer-
check those bearings and brakes a bit more regular!! May save you heaps of money as
well :-). Cheers Tony
Reply By: Member - Tony B (Malanda FNQ) - Saturday, Apr 04, 2009 at 17:40
Saturday, Apr 04, 2009 at 17:40
Woops should be Can't always - I have always managed to pick a flat tyre in the past ... but your wheel just about to fall off...mmmmmmm!
AnswerID:
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Follow Up By: Member - Tony B (Malanda FNQ) - Saturday, Apr 04, 2009 at 18:01
Saturday, Apr 04, 2009 at 18:01
Anyone done a dual axle upgrade and found the benifit? On giving it some thought this boat may be a bit large for the single axle trailer.
Looks like these days you can buy the bolt on axle components, so think I may go Dual.
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Reply By: Member - William H (WA) - Saturday, Apr 04, 2009 at 19:38
Saturday, Apr 04, 2009 at 19:38
Tony b.
I am building a tandem trailer with 50 mill axel's, what i have done is get four toyota spindals from the front diffs from a wrecker, and then turned of the part that holds the disc brake assembly,so it will hold the disc pad assembly,Image Could Not Be Found
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Reply By: Member - William H (WA) - Saturday, Apr 04, 2009 at 20:00
Saturday, Apr 04, 2009 at 20:00
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The two axels will be fitted onto two and a half ton springs, to make the tandem set up, for the camper trailer im building, i wont have trouble with bearings or broken axels,when travelling, im keeping the same on the trailer as the toyota, cost for the axels were $375:00, dollars.$80:00 for the four sets of bearings from Ebay, $40:00 for spindal's,$60:00 for calapers. Hubs came with the spindals.
Cheers for now...William H...Bunbury...WA.
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Follow Up By: Member - Tony B (Malanda FNQ) - Sunday, Apr 05, 2009 at 07:32
Sunday, Apr 05, 2009 at 07:32
William H - That is a seriously HD AXLE Setup. When I had the mishap we took the axle in to town and got a new stub welded on to the 45mm solid axle to get us out of trouble. I have been told by a few
places that this is not legal, as a welded axle is not allowed. (2t axle plus should be turned from solid steel?)
I see you have welded, and at the back and front. (Good job too) Have you looked into the legalities?
My repaired axle is a butt weld by an engineering firm, but the weld sits 1/2 way between the spring U bolts and the back of the hub, not a good place given the lever action.
Cheers Tony
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Reply By: obee1212 - Saturday, Apr 04, 2009 at 20:28
Saturday, Apr 04, 2009 at 20:28
I replaced the bearing for a trip north two years ago and when I had travelled about 300k I thought it might be a good idea to
check the bearings and found I had not tightened them right down before backing off. Yep I kicked the wheels and one wobbled like it wanted to go somewhere. Close call but luckily we have one side of our brains ticking away ready to remind us that we missed something.
Owen
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Follow Up By: Member - Tony B (Malanda FNQ) - Sunday, Apr 05, 2009 at 07:38
Sunday, Apr 05, 2009 at 07:38
Owen - Yes that is a trick I learnt long ago. Funny thing is as I loaded the boat up to the car the night before I had a strong feeling to
check the Brakes & bearings. Shame I put that aside and brushed it off, 30 minutes of checking would have saved a lot of $ and time. Hindsight is a good thing. Cheers Tony
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Reply By: Kim and Damn Dog - Saturday, Apr 04, 2009 at 23:05
Saturday, Apr 04, 2009 at 23:05
Gidday Tony
I think I can go one better than that. We had a 12’ tinny which was carried around on a light weight trailer and it had been over its fair share of rough tracks.
We launched it at
Tamboon Inlet one weekend and went to the car for some gear and a beer. Around about half an hour later, the mate asked ‘where’s the boat gone’.
It soon became obvious that the bloody thing had sunk. After quite a bit of effort in getting it back to shore, I noticed two holes opposite each other in the hull, which I couldn’t figure out until we got it back on the trailer.
The bearer supports had worn the hull through with all the bouncing around on rough tracks.
So the lesson to be learnt from this is to
check and make sure the boat will float before putting it into the water!
PS I could write a book on some of the dumb things I’ve done with boats.
Regards
Kim
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Follow Up By: Member - Tony B (Malanda FNQ) - Sunday, Apr 05, 2009 at 08:01
Sunday, Apr 05, 2009 at 08:01
Kim - What a Bummer.... I nearly did the same type of thing, saw it just in time. We towed a tinny up the
Bloomfield Track and a roller on the trailer collapsed, this in turn exposed the bracket to the boat to pound on and put holes in the bottom. Still got our fishing trip in though as I always carry a roll of the two part
putty.
While out 30 ks off shore I have had a boat split at the bow and the water started pouring in. Got lucky and was able to trim the motor to lift the bow enough to get
home.
Was one of your dumb things forgetting to put the bungs in? I think we may have all done that at some time :-). Cheers Tony
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Follow Up By: Member - William H (WA) - Sunday, Apr 05, 2009 at 10:21
Sunday, Apr 05, 2009 at 10:21
Good morning all......."Kim what a sinking feeling"...lol..ok i nearly had a same problem like that, the strap that was covering the boat to hold it on tight broke, so tied a knot in it, and then i got the spare inner tube from the Toyota, put it under the boat and inflated it till the strap was tight, and the boat was secure,got me
home and then fixed the problem, the other thing i do is get a to part foam product, that you mix together, and then pour it into all the vacant compartments that are not used, and this helps with the boat not sinking, if something goes wrong out their.
Cheers for now...William H...Bunbury...WA.
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Follow Up By: Kim and Damn Dog - Sunday, Apr 05, 2009 at 12:08
Sunday, Apr 05, 2009 at 12:08
Tony
Don't talk to me about bungs.
Quite a few years back we purchased a new 19’ Haines Hunter (my pride and joy).
During the second trip out we went up to
Lake Eildon and stopped on the shore for a picnic. A one point the missus remarked ‘gee, the boat looks sleek’. I looked at it, then the penny dropped....we were sinking!
Luckily I found a piece of wood to stick in one of the bung holes, and the speed of the boat on the way back was enough to stop anymore water coming in until we got to the ramp.
Guess where the bungs were. In me top pocket.
LOL
Regards
Kim
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