wheel bearing and tire temperatures
When you use a digital infrared temperature sensor what are the acceptable temperatures for tires and wheel bearing in the summer? Basically when it is in the 90's outside.
Forum Discussion
My son and I just experienced an issue with bearings, brakes and heat. I purchased an infrared temperature guage so we could get a more scientific conclusion on his problem. It's on a boat trailer with surge drum brakes but I will comment here on our issues and results. Hopefully this info will shed some light on your issues with your RV.
He had experienced massive bearing failure last season and to make a long story short we replaced spindles, bearings and seals. Of course after being stranded along the road he was terribly nervous about heat issues and it did seem to both of us that his axle with the brakes would have considerably more heat than the axle without brakes. I tried to convince him this was probably normal since brakes work by creating friction and friction is heat! After buying the infrared temp sensor we determined that the brake drum would reach 160 after coming to a stop. The bearing hub of the drum would soon heat up to 145 and I'm sure if we continuously made stops and down hill driving the hubs and drum would have gone higher in temperature. The rim would somewhat follow this rise in temp but probably not get as hot as the drum. We decided that the bearing grease we were using (Lucas Red and Tacky) had a drop temperature of 475 degrees so it should not be an issue with drums getting up to nearly 200. Drop temperature is where the grease turns to a liquid I believe.
My boat trailer has disc surge brakes and as we all know run much cooler with less fading than drum brakes. I checked the temperature on my rotors after pulling my boat home and coming down a small hill. The rotors were 135/140 but the callipers were 160. These numbers seemed very similar to his so we determined that everything should be ok. Just to ease our mind though I measured the rotor temp on my 2500 Dodge Cummins to see what the tow vehicle brakes ran at. I read neary 200 on the front rotors!!!!!
So in summary I believe axles without brakes will run around 115/120 degrees and axles with brakes will, depending on how much stopping you do, can run up to 160+ degrees with no apparent issue with bearings. My truck runs much hotter than this and there are no issues with bearings! Harbor Freight has small infrared temp sensors for $20 right now and it is a great tool and apparently accurate. I have measured everything around the house such as the thermometer on the patio. They compare very close.
We did not measure any tire temperatures since bearing failure has been his problem and constant worry. I will measure tires on the next trip. I have pulled my 5th wheel in the mountains of WV and have at times generated some significant heat I'm sure. With good seals and proper bearing maintenance I have never experienced a bearing failure. I will carry my new infrared temp sensor on the road and monitor what my 5th wheel temperatures are. I'm sure I'm going to seee temps of 180+. I think the main issue you need to concern yourself with is that do you have one wheel running hotter thatn the others. This is a red flag and you need to find out why!!
I hope find this information and our experiences helpful.
He had experienced massive bearing failure last season and to make a long story short we replaced spindles, bearings and seals. Of course after being stranded along the road he was terribly nervous about heat issues and it did seem to both of us that his axle with the brakes would have considerably more heat than the axle without brakes. I tried to convince him this was probably normal since brakes work by creating friction and friction is heat! After buying the infrared temp sensor we determined that the brake drum would reach 160 after coming to a stop. The bearing hub of the drum would soon heat up to 145 and I'm sure if we continuously made stops and down hill driving the hubs and drum would have gone higher in temperature. The rim would somewhat follow this rise in temp but probably not get as hot as the drum. We decided that the bearing grease we were using (Lucas Red and Tacky) had a drop temperature of 475 degrees so it should not be an issue with drums getting up to nearly 200. Drop temperature is where the grease turns to a liquid I believe.
My boat trailer has disc surge brakes and as we all know run much cooler with less fading than drum brakes. I checked the temperature on my rotors after pulling my boat home and coming down a small hill. The rotors were 135/140 but the callipers were 160. These numbers seemed very similar to his so we determined that everything should be ok. Just to ease our mind though I measured the rotor temp on my 2500 Dodge Cummins to see what the tow vehicle brakes ran at. I read neary 200 on the front rotors!!!!!
So in summary I believe axles without brakes will run around 115/120 degrees and axles with brakes will, depending on how much stopping you do, can run up to 160+ degrees with no apparent issue with bearings. My truck runs much hotter than this and there are no issues with bearings! Harbor Freight has small infrared temp sensors for $20 right now and it is a great tool and apparently accurate. I have measured everything around the house such as the thermometer on the patio. They compare very close.
We did not measure any tire temperatures since bearing failure has been his problem and constant worry. I will measure tires on the next trip. I have pulled my 5th wheel in the mountains of WV and have at times generated some significant heat I'm sure. With good seals and proper bearing maintenance I have never experienced a bearing failure. I will carry my new infrared temp sensor on the road and monitor what my 5th wheel temperatures are. I'm sure I'm going to seee temps of 180+. I think the main issue you need to concern yourself with is that do you have one wheel running hotter thatn the others. This is a red flag and you need to find out why!!
I hope find this information and our experiences helpful.
