I sympathize with 'jfint'. I too lost a wheel bearing on my 'new-to-me' Prindle 19 trailer when towing my cat back from the seller's home.

Of course, being my first trailer I didn't know anything about wheel bearings or what to check for. Fortunately for me... the wheel bearing burnt up and imploded JUST 1 block from my home! But (and this is a BIG but - no pun intended) that was AFTER towing the thing over 1,000 MILES from Northern CA to Seattle!!! What are the odds?? The good Lord was definitely looking out for me that time. Immediately afterward I learned everything (I think) I need to know about my trailer wheel bearings. I bought all new hubs, bearings and even wheels at $200+ dollars. Then I tore the old stuff apart and took photos of every step of the rebuild process (which I hope to post online with a tutorial some day).

I think the key for a newbie is: if you don't know anything about wheel bearings and you're going to pick up a new boat... AT LEAST buy a grease gun and fill up the bearing buddies with grease. If the trailer does not have bearing buddies (mine did not) run to the boat store on your way to the seller's home and BUY two bearing buddies and a grease gun. Install them on the spot and squirt your bearings full of grease.

In my case (although I was really upset at the time) I was very, VERY fortunate. The catch 22 is that... most novice boat owners know NOTHING about trailer bearings. The only way most learn is only after one burns up on them tragically.

Sincerely,
-Dan

Wow, I don't think that I've ever towed a light trailer more that about 500mi. Horse trailer yeah, but that is a completely differnet deal, with more complex hubs(though not that much more), and brakes. If you go that far to pick up a trailer you should deffinately take some bearing grease and re-pak that bearing, its super, super easy on littel trailers if you don't mind getting your hands dirty, and if your uncomfortable any tire store will do it fore pretty cheap. I've been checking around, and since even after the wreck my bearing was still good, no one has been able to tell me how to check for what went wrong with mine, only thing to say is make sure that there are no obvious cracks in the hub casting.

I hope everyone with busted boats gets the running soon, I hope to put mine back together this saturday(not today) and get it back in the water on sunday. With an luck, I'll have it tunned up in time to go to a reggatta in Santa barabara the followign weekend. But hey we'll see.

Anyone going to that Wine & Roses reggatta in Santa Barbara???

I had the berrings on my trailer disintegrate on the way to Hobie Mega Nationals from Colorado. I stopped at a tiny gas station in Pig Fart, Arkansas and while making a trip around the trailer noticed the hub resting on the bare axle - not good. It was pouring rain and I had visions of leaving the boat and driving around for hours looking for a place to fix it. As I stood there getting wet and looking around in desperation, I spotted a big blue building 200 yards away with a big sign that said, "Truck and Trailer Repair." It was my lucky day. Three hours later I had all new berrings and was standing on a sunny beach in Ft. Walton

I think maybe I sounded kind of preachy by inferring that most people don't know anything about trailer bearings and that bearings are usually always the problem, etc., etc.

Oh well. There is one thing I am sure about though: I certainly didn't know anything! lol

Likewise I think I sounded defensive, sorry Danno, I was honestly just continueing the conversation because like I said I think I had a pretty rare thingy happen.

Something I just thought of, I think that I said in an earlier thread that I thought rollers instead of craddles were OK. Well I have to take that back, most of the damage done to my hull was at the roller, even the wheel hitting the hull did less damage. I have craddles in the front and rollers in the back right now. I think I will be replacing the rollers wiht good craddles as soon as I get the chance.

I learned (the hard way of course) that my cradles work best when they actually have some carpet on them! Boy did I put a big nick in one hull trying to slide it up onto a bare metal cradle. Ouch. Totally my fault of course. My dumb little mistakes often irritate me more than the big ones.

At least with a BIG mistake you always have an interesting story to tell.

A new A-cat sailor has quite rough rubbed spots in the white gelcoat from all 4 cradles on his new boat. He is not happy.
The short pile stock carpet on these cradles was apparently very tough stuff: put soft (yellowish) polyurethane foam sheets in between, or canvas or ???? Please Use Something!

The "marine" carpet (intended for use inside of boats) works great on cradles. Soft, supple, and water proof it will be supporting my new F18 as soon as I finish my new cradles. Available at a home improvement store near you.

When I sold my old SC tornado to a guy from Vancouver, BC, he drove down to Los Angeles to collect it. I took the trailer in to a trailer place the day before his arrival and paid ~$100 for completely new bearings/hubs, installed! At that price, why bother doing the work yourself!

Mike.

The previous owner of my F-27 had done about $1K worth of work to the trailer, and the tires (four plus spare) looked perfectly fine, so I figured he had replaced them or at least they were recent.

I paid a delivery guy to trailer the boat from Florida to Maryland for me. It turned out the tires were old but with little wear to the tread. The trailer blew tires all the way up the coast. Each time added to the delivery cost. After the first one blew I should have told the delivery guy to replace them all at the first chance, but for some reason it didn't occur to me. He said he had thought of it but didn't mention it because he thought I think he was trying to bilk me.

Fortunately no damage to the boat or trailer, but it did drive home a point - trailer tires may look fine, but you have to know their age. They rot just sitting around...

Tires do have a date stamp on them and you can expect them to be reliable only 5-7 years. I found this to be true on my RV (at 6 years old but great tread, I kept loosing tires).

The prindle got in the water this weekend, unfortunately, while some of you were having a hurricane, I was getting very light wind. Just barely got the hull out once, and didn't get to trap out, but I did get to sail my boat!! It deffinately feels different from the Ncaras. i was considering racing it this coming weekend, but now i think that I will take some time to get used too it, and take a weekend off from boating to spend soem more time with my fiance. I've been driving up and down the coast the last two or three weekends trying to get parts and get things repaired.