Mobile Home Axle Hub Swap

[Mike Smith]

I've got a nice little heavy duty tandem axle trailer that I picked up from my neighbor and need some advice. It currently has 2 axles from a mobile home frame on it and I would like to convert it to a regular car or truck wheel hub. Does anyone know of a swap kit perhaps or anything that would just swap out to make this conversion? The mobile home tires are getting vey hard to come by these days in our parts and in NC you're not supposed to run them anyway on a private trailer.

Thanks in advance,

Mike

[Gasengin]

I'm sitting in the same situation right now. I have ran trailer house axles for about 10 years on my trailer. They worked, but I had to work on them too much. I had problems with the brakes and the springs. I have the single leaf trailer house springs and I've broke several over the years. I didn't have any problem with tires or rims. I use lowboy tires that are available at any good tire dealer. If you put many miles on at fast speed, you will almost surely have trouble with the trailer house tires. Before you do anything, take a look at the springs and holders. If you don't have slipper springs or heavy duty eye to eye multi-leaf spings, I'd look at replacing the springs also. Do you have brakes? By the time you do all this, you might as well replace everything. Right now I'm switching my axles out to tortion axles. To answer your original question, I know that Six Robblee's Inc, Seattle, WA had the hubs you are looking for (don't know if they still carry them).

[Mike Smith]

These are the monoleafs and my Dad and I have run these same axles and tires for years on several trailers including our tandem axle car hauler. Believe me if high speeds would have been a problem we would have known it long ago. We've had the car hauler for about 20 yrs. now and hauled untold loads and never had a minutes problem ever with the axles or springs.

Mike

[MoRo]

Like any piece of equipment, trailers and their componants have their limitations. not overloading goes a long way in preserving the working life of your trailer, tires, axles, hubs, bearings, and brakes.
My two sense worth!

[Gasengin]

More power to you if you can run the monoleaf springs. I wish I could get away with them. Over the years, I've had three break and one bend. I did notice that the original springs which were twenty to thirty years old lasted better than the newer ones I used as replacements. About 6 months ago, I put one set of multi-leaf trailer house springs, but have not had them on long enough to give an evaluation. My trailer has never been overloaded, not used rough, and never pulled fast (65mph max). I pull it about 5000 miles a year. Maybe it's the rough Montana and Saskatchewan hiways I drive on here? I didn't get an exact price quote, but the estimate to put slipper springs, hubs and brake was only about $300 less than replacing everything. I did get a fairly good price on the tortion axles as a local trailer builder accidentilly ordered a size of axle they don't nornally use, but happens to be correct for my trailer.

[ListerDiesel]

Originally Posted by Mike Smith

I've got a nice little heavy duty tandem axle trailer that I picked up from my neighbor and need some advice. It currently has 2 axles from a mobile home frame on it and I would like to convert it to a regular car or truck wheel hub. Does anyone know of a swap kit perhaps or anything that would just swap out to make this conversion? The mobile home tires are getting vey hard to come by these days in our parts and in NC you're not supposed to run them anyway on a private trailer.

Thanks in advance,

Mike

Just looking in here, so apologies if I get the wrong end of the details!

By 'mobile home' axles I assume you mean axles from what we would call a 'static' caravan which has the axles and wheels purely for moving to a site, after which they are not used?

These we have here also, and they are generally unbraked with low speed rating tyres, used once and then in many cases taken off completely once the unit is sited.

We designed and built our own trailer some years back, and went for rubber suspension beams, never had a minutes trouble and very smooth riding. We don't tend to have the sizes of trailers in the UK that you go up to in the US, ours is rated 2.6 tons gross, but you can get the beams up to 1800kg per beam 0r nearly 4 tons for a pair. The independent units go up to 1500kg each, or 3000kg a pair, so that would be 6000kg for a four wheel trailer. (miltiply the kg weight by 2.2 to get lbs)

One thing we don't have over here and I would love to see is the electric braking systems that we saw at Portland over the years. We can have overrun brakes (surge brakes) or full air braking but nobody has done or had passed for use, a decent electric braking system that I know of.

Peter

[MoRo]

Ok, I'd like to have my curiosity satisfied. When you guys suffered broken springs, did it happen when the trailer was empty or loaded?
~M~

[Gasengin]

I havn't had a real pattern to may breaks. Once empty, once with about 5000 GTW and once with about 7000 GTW.
Merlin

[Les]

I work on trailers for a living and many of the mh axles are the same as a 6k axle. The inner and outer bearings are the same and the brakes should be 12" x 2" Dexter axles carries the same bearings on the id. from a 5200 lb to a 7000 lb axle On an old travel trailer the axles could either be a 3.5k or a 6k. The 3.5k is 2 3/8" dia and the 6k is a 3" dia axle. If they are old enough to be square then the 6k is 2", the 5200lb is 1 3/4, and the 3.5k is 1 1/2" although we don't run across them all that often anymore. Any trailer place could help you out, I've seen many builders advertised in yor area and I'm sure that they would be happy to help.

[armorsmith]

Les,
I recently aquired a pair of OLD mobile home axles, and my best guess is they are from a 10' x 40' mobile, circa 1950 (I saw the chasis before it was cut up for scrap.). The tires are maked 7-14.5, and the rims have a 5 lug, 5.5" bolt circle. I know the tire size has not been made in quite some time, but I an not having any luck with finding replacement rims either. The springs are a 6 leaf package with 25 1/4" eye centers (3,300 lbs ea I think). I am also looking to find out if I can replace these hubs with more modern ones. My next step would be to micrometer the spindles and go to Dexter.

Thanks in advance for any help.

Bob

[John G. Simpson]

armorsmith
5 x 5 1/2 is a very common size.
jeep 4wd, many full size chrysler and some older ford truck.junk yards shoud have plenty.
john
hope this helps

[armorsmith]

Thanks John,

I wasn't aware that those cars used that large a wheel pattern.

I now have some more information, now that I have gotten one wheel off the hub. The brake drum is a 2 piece design, using a steel stamping for the hub center protion, this being riveted to a cast drum part. I haven't seen those since I was a tike in my dad's auto shop working on cars of the '40s, '50s vintage.

Since I believe that the old 2 piece brake drums are no longer acceptable, I will most likely persue measuring the spindle and seeing if Dexter has a hub/drum that will work.

Thanks for your response.

Bob

[HalfKeck]

The 14.5 tire sizes are still available, though I think it sounds like you are on the right track by getting away from them. We sell those sizes once in a while, construction trailers still use them. We have used mobile home axles in several trailers and they work well in some instances and bad in others. One memorable occasion involved blowing several tires on a borrowed trailer and actually stopping at mobile homes by the side of the road and buying the tires that were still under the mobile home when they delivered it just to get home

[Fordman]

Folks, depending on which vintage axles you have, hubs are available. The later wide 5 pattern , go to Northern Hydraulics, they have 6 lug Chevy pattern hubs, brake kits, etc. The earlier axles I've ran into, used 6 lug and 5 on 5.5 patterns, use an odd size inner bearing, and requires an obscure inner car bearing, but some trailer parts sites have an idler hub for these.

[slug]

I have worked on many. If they are mobile home axles and need parts get rid of them. Replace them with good guality axles that will carry the weight you need and then add some. Six robles In Yakima WA, Seattle WA and portland oregon can help you out. I have some other supplires in the North west if you need.

John