LIKENIT wrote:
That's the same thing I do, but I've wondered what the temps should be that we want to stay under. Checking temps before hitting the road and during stops might also shed some light. I mostly compare tires. It would seem to me that the temp would give some indication of the weight on each tire, provided they are all inflated at the same psi. I am going to try to get my trailer on a Cat Scale and see if I have room to get separate weights for front and rear axles.
While using a hand held IR gun is reasonable on an object made of a conductive material (metal)as the temperature is more consistent across a large portion of the surface. You need to remember that rubber is an insulator so it takes time for heat to be transferred from the heat source - deep inside the tire structure - out to the surface. The air inside a tire will conduct heat to the rim which conducts the heat away to the outside air. The surface of the tire has large variations in thickness which results in very large differences in surface temperature so getting to the hot spot is just not possible with the low cost units. Also always shooting at the identical spot would mean you had a spot identified on the tire and a fixture to keep the distance and angle constant.
Monitoring the tire pressure, with a known accurate pressure gauge, is more meaningful but this also assumes you have accurately identified the real load on each tire. This is something that only a small % of RV owners have done.
What is the actual load on each of your tires?
What size and Load Range ?
What is the cold inflation you set your tires to?
Have you confirmed your gauge is accurate to +/- a couple psi?
