Trailer axle update

Typical of repurposed truck or automotive axles reused for a homemade trailer. If you get new bearings, make sure to get new seals, too.

You could just get a different ball mount for the truck; probably the cheapest, most varied, and most common towing part ever, other than the ball itself--this assumes you are using a real hitch and not just a ball on the step bumper. Got a welder? Reconfigure your trailer hitch to change the height.

Or just grit your teeth and pay the shipping to buy a proper drop axle from one of the mailorder places like etrailer.com, trailerpart.com, northerntool.com (unless you happen to live close to one of their retail stores), southwestwheel.com, or championtrailers.com

You'd then be able to rest secure in the knowledge that replacement parts from then on out will be readily available and you'd know what they are (the champion trailers site has a particularly useful amount of information).

There's another option which acts like a drop axle when properly configured, and has the added benefit of having a suspension: the torsion axle. I'll let you consult google for the details. They would allow you to either completely eliminate your leaf springs, or if your trailer was made like some I've seen where the axle was directly welded to the frame, add springs.

Note too that both straight and drop axles can be configured two ways, over or under the springs, depending on which way the spring mount pads are welded on, which gives you more ride height options. Simply flipping them over isn't a good idea, since most trailer axles curve up slightly in the center to make them tow better.

Also consider getting a hitch scale.

has one listed for sale down at the bottom, but read the whole article anyway.

What you have is a 6 stud Toyota or Nissan - almost guaranteed . Chevy had mostly 78mm center holes, while yours is about 93mm.

Nissans were 100mm, and Toyota 108mm, and were generally bolt-centric

- NOT Hub-centric(meaning they had clearance between the rim hole and the hub center)

Toyota DOES use the Timken 1779 - as does Chevy. Don't think Nissan does - so that pretty well narrows it down to Early Toyota Hilux if it is a front wheel with drum brakes

There is no gap between the hub and wheel centers. Also, for some reason this has a metal screw on dust cap. Does anyone know of a vehicle that had a large diameter screw on dust cap? Also there are 15 inch tires on it. (205 70 r 15).

Not off hand, anything with that style is likely to be ancient. As I understand it, one style ofscrew on cap was used with bulk grease, applied by hand, and then screwed down every so often to force more grease into the bearing. Not saying that's what you have, but it's beginning to sound like it.

The right way to fix this is to shell out the money to upgrade the axles. There is no correct cheap way to fix this.

OK - the 15 inch tires could be from anything. The bolt pattern is common enough - but 93mm centers are NOT common. Nor are thread-on dust caps, since about 1930-ish.

15 inch wheels were not common that far back, so that pretty well rules outautomotive hubs that I'm aquainted with.

Reliable Axle DID produce 6 on 5.5 steel hubs for drum brake applications (10 and 12 inch) with thread on caps. These are OIL BATH hubs, not grease-packed - not sure if they use the timken bearings you have.

Eastern Marine's Trailer Superstore has them listed for 13 and 17 bucks - reliable part number 250-031620 and 21 (10 and 12 inch respectively ) - their stock number 5291153 and 54 - 1-800-453-7379.

These are aluminum thread-on dust caps, with "O"rings, for oil bath boat trailer hubs.

IF these are Reliable Axle boat trailer hubs, as I am starting to suspect, the parts ARE available and reasonable - and they are high quality hubs - and they may NOT be home-made axles.

These axles and hubs were fairly common on heavy duty twin axle boat trailers several years back. (up to 3500 lb per axle)