Road Wheels with Plain Bearings

[listerdiesel]

Originally Posted by Hanno Spoelstra

I can see the plain bearings working well in slow-speed load carring applications.
These days Carrier restorers sometimes have to compete for wheels with people restoring static machinery etc.
Maybe they would be glad to fit those plain bearings Carrier guys are tossing out?

H.

Hanno:

In all cases, we have taken wheels with scrap tyres and left good ones in the system, we have never used wheels with good tyres that could be re-used by a Carrier owner.

In any event, 1940's rubber is a bit past its sell by date and anyone contemplating using such needs a word of caution.

The bearing sizes are Imperial, not metric, so the ID is 1-1/4" for a genuine bearing, the 50mm ID is what we used on our engine trollies. They are about £6.80 each if you buy 10 off ebay, size is 6310 by memory.

Buying unbranded bearings is a bit of a leap into the unknown, but bearing sources are so widespread now that you are probably going to be pushed to find a bad bearing.

We have two engines on the wheels now, the first set were re-used on our second trolley, but we plan to ship those over to Roy next year before the Nuenen show, so that we can collect a re-tyred set from him.





Regarding using plain bearings on the trollies, we find that the extra drag makes the trollies hard to move, they go over a ton each. Roy's new tyres have been good, no problems at all and the rolling resistance is low compared with rubber.

Lastly, a picture of our trailer/RV that we carry our largest engine round in and where we live and sleep while at shows:



This was taken this Monday as we were about to leave Little Casterton in Lincolnshire.

Regards to all,

Peter