Vault hubs after 15 years ?

[SkiTundra]

We've a 2008 Prestige trailer for our 211TE. According to Vault there's no need to do anything for at least 10 years but not a lot of information for beyond 10 years. Is there a need to rebuild them? Or if they're not showing obvious signs of leakage then should be OK?

Trailer doesn't get a lot of use, a 60 mile round trip to Marine Max each year and maybe a 100-200 mile RT to visit friends every other year or so is about it.

Thanks,

[malibud]

oil filled or grease ?

[SkiTundra]

oil filled or grease ?

I believe all Vaults are hybrid.

[bturner]

As with most maintenance topics there are various opinions on when or how often they should be performed and bearing maintenance is certainly one of them. For your use, you could easily talk yourself into doing nothing using the logic that if it isn't broke don't fix it and be fine. If you go this route I would certainly be more diligent checking for leaks and temp of the hubs while towing. I see nothing wrong with this and I'm a big trailer maintenance kind of guy. I have a friend with a 06 Malibu that basically tows 6 miles to the ramp twice a year that has never touched anything on his trailer (wheels, tires, brakes, hubs) and has had zero issues. Would I tow 200 miles with this trailer as it is? No, but a total of maybe 50 a year, probably.

There are plenty of YouTube videos of people rebuilding Vault hubs and they sell service kits so this is something that is recommended and people do. You seem to be somewhat in the middle as you do tow that trip every other year that I would consider far enough to make sure my trailer was in excellent condition. Having been stranded on the side of a busy freeway in my youth I personally learned that I never wanted to be in that position again. This has led me to changing out tires every 5 year regardless of how new they look and doing the recommended maintenance on the trailer (flushing the brake fluid every other year, repacking bearing or changing the oil in oil bath hubs, etc.) to avoid being in that position again if possible.

If it were me and this was a year I wasn't towing 100 miles I'd let it slide until next year. If I were doing the trip this year I'd probably bite the bullet and go all in on maintenance. I'd replace the tires if they needed it, flush the brake fluid and do the bearings. That way I'd be done with the tires for 5 years, done with the bearing for 10 and just have the brake fluid to mess with which isn't a big deal for me as I have a Motive bleeder and am lucky enough to have the boat off the trailer when doing maintenance which makes everything so much easier to work on.

[MN Ryan]

Tires...I really should replace them this spring.

[Scooter G]

bturner always has excellent insight and advice, I would follow that direction. When trailer gremlins surface, it is always the wrong place at the wrong time, 100 stories in my pocket.
For what it's worth, my source for trailers tires (not affiliated), they have fast shipping, and I have a hard time beating there price elsewhere:
https://tiresshipped2you.com/
I just replaced 4 trailer tires on the Boatmate, the spare was new. I think I posted this in another thread. The tire shop, hit me at $125 for mounting, balancing, and old tire disposal. I figured I saved about $275 to $300 compared to 2 other local quotes. As my Dad used to say, "That's a pizza and a beer, boy". But Dad, I'm not old enough to drink beer, lol. I know it's like taking your steak to the restaurant and asking them to cook it medium rare, but I spend enough money with them in other areas, so not a problem.

[bturner]

Yeah, this reminds me..... I'm doing a 250 mile trip this summer and need to flush the brakes and be more diligent on my trailer inspection this spring. This is my fourth season with this trailer and didn't take my own advice on flushing the brake lines. Got too involved doing the refurb on the BIL's trailer last year and let mine slide. I'll be throwing no stones on trailer maintenance this season....

[shag]

BT is spot on. Trailers have a way of showing why you need maintenance, when it's least convenient ... And even dangerous. ANYTHING 15 years old is going to scrutiny and maintenance checks from me.

[Scooter G]

That way I'd be done with the tires for 5 years, done with the bearing for 10 and just have the brake fluid to mess with which isn't a big deal for me as I have a Motive bleeder and am lucky enough to have the boat off the trailer when doing maintenance which makes everything so much easier to work on.

I pulled up a few youtube videos after you mentioned the Motive Bleeder, that is a pretty slick way of taking care of business. I did a friends boat last weekend, the old fasion way, pretty low on my list of favorite things to do. That thing looks like it puts some fun in the process in the $60 range on the Amazon. bturner, I'm assuming you are using the UFP clamp assembly mentioned in the video, where the heck did you find that?

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Y4u8awoDOCE

[Scooter G]

My apologies for the thread hijack.
I found the bleeder clamp on the motive webside, umm, for $239, ya no.

This one looks doable, and a little more realistic @ $44. I would spend $100 and some change all day long not to have to cramp out my forearms upside down with a screw driver bleeding brakes (speaking for my wife), in 1/10th the time....

https://www.ebay.com/itm/184417037205

[bturner]

I had the cheaper one for years but ditched the cheap azz chains for some cables with loops I made which worked a lot better. About 4 years ago one of the guys that I help with his boat wanted me to do his brakes end to end and offered to buy the expensive clamp adapter for doing his brakes. I now have the $150 version (that's what it cost 4 years ago) and it's wonderful. If he hadn't bought it for me I'd still be using the old set up. I have most of the adapters as well and have used this for everything from my daughter's Escape to my 70 Mustang.

I agree though, I would never had bought it for myself. Time to start getting tools for doing this work for your buddies. The shop was looking for something like $1200 to do his brakes. Everyone ended up happy.

[Scooter G]

$1200, holy moly! Well maybe not so bad, if they are rebuilding the calipers, turning the rotors, packing the bearings, brake bleed, and then standing behind their work.

I think the $150 version went to $239 in 4 years, like everything else. I need some friends like yours, lol. I looked at the chain version of the adapter, it looked a little cheesy.
I think I will roll with the Ebay version, see how it goes, when it comes time for the next bleed rodeo. Thanks for the insight.

[bturner]

The money goes quick. He needed 4 calipers as the bleeders were completely frozen (~$120 per at the time), bearing service, fluid flush and said they were needed to rebuild the actuator. I think they had him for something like 8 hours of labor which to be honest I had that into it. That and I'm sure they built the "surely this is going to be a mess" time into the estimate and the "nobody wants to work on trailers" factor into it.

Trailers can be tough to work on and there are not a lot of shops that want to do this work or do it right, at least not around here. A lot of trailers have just plain been neglected and can end up being a rats nest of frozen slider pins, bolts and rust to deal with. Seems like every one of these I get talked into doing that I think are going to only take a couple hours ends up taking a couple days to get out of my driveway.

This is what I typically run into which was the BIL's trailer I was going to re carpet bunks and flush the brake fluid on. I ended up doing rust repair, 2 calipers, change the bearing oil, 2 new bunks, re-carpet all the bunks, new bow roller, winch strap, new step pads, wheels/tires and probably a lot of other stuff my PTSD from this is blocking.....

[Scooter G]

Nice work bturner, a lot of work to boot. You've got a nice side gig going if you ever quit your day job.
That brake fluid was hack, wow, so messed up.
Ditto on the trailer maintenance, staying on top of it can go a long ways, and save you 8 plus hours of wasted (rewarding) lake time in one shot.
We should start a thread, best & worst trailers in the parking lot (and D-bag parking jobs).
Sorry SkiTundra, did you get your question answered? lol

[MN Ryan]

Worst trailer? My BIL has an '05 MasterCraft trailer that might be in the running. Every time I see it, I cringe. Of course, with my luck, I will be the one that gets stranded despite being on top of maintenance with mine.