First part to wheel aligning a trailer is to triangulate axle to hitch using tape /string line . Then measure toe-in with straight edges on wheel mounting surface on drum/ disc . around .5 --1.5mm per side
Carl from an Engineering viewpoint, the straighened axle is now weeker than the orignal unbent axle. - the internal stress distrubution in the shaft when initially bent made it stronger and less likely to bend again under the same load that originally bent it. - when the shaft was bent back straight, this "strengthning due to bending" was effectivly redone in the opposit direction, ie it is now weeker, less fatigue resistant and more prone to bending in the direction of the inital bending than it was both before and after the initial bend. - I strongly recomend puting the new one in, and keeping the old one as a spare. The other thing that comes to mind is that it looks like the shaft can be bolted on in any rotational direction - you could consider rotating a bent shaft by 90 degrees (yes this will muck up the camber, but that is better than bad toeout) - the other thing that could be considered as a tempory field fix, is using some structural (hardened) washersat the bolt up area to somewhat correct the alignment of a bent assembly I am a little surprised that the shop in Cairns did not consider fiting the shaft into a lathe chuck and then skim the bolt up face to correct the alignemnt. All the best with your travels
Thanks for the advice I am definitely going to swap the axel over when we get to somewhere I can work on the trailer comfortably. I was going to rotate it 90degrees if it wasn’t able to be straightened. All the best Carl.
![Customer States & Mechanical Fails [Ep 44] #mechanic #fails #cs](http://i.ytimg.com/vi/VNA5ov1sZHo/mqdefault.jpg)
![Customer States & Mechanical Fails [Ep 44] #mechanic #fails #cs](/img/tr.png)
Love the looks from Colleen while Carl is explaining the axel set up. She was so interested!
Ha ha, I think she was just fascinated by the mechanical prowess!!! 😄😄
First part to wheel aligning a trailer is to triangulate axle to hitch using tape /string line .
Then measure toe-in with straight edges on wheel mounting surface on drum/ disc .
around .5 --1.5mm per side
Carl
from an Engineering viewpoint, the straighened axle is now weeker than the orignal unbent axle.
- the internal stress distrubution in the shaft when initially bent made it stronger and less likely to bend again under the same load that originally bent it.
- when the shaft was bent back straight, this "strengthning due to bending" was effectivly redone in the opposit direction, ie it is now weeker, less fatigue resistant and more prone to bending in the direction of the inital bending than it was both before and after the initial bend.
- I strongly recomend puting the new one in, and keeping the old one as a spare.
The other thing that comes to mind is that it looks like the shaft can be bolted on in any rotational direction
- you could consider rotating a bent shaft by 90 degrees (yes this will muck up the camber, but that is better than bad toeout)
- the other thing that could be considered as a tempory field fix, is using some structural (hardened) washersat the bolt up area to somewhat correct the alignment of a bent assembly
I am a little surprised that the shop in Cairns did not consider fiting the shaft into a lathe chuck and then skim the bolt up face to correct the alignemnt.
All the best with your travels
Thanks for the advice I am definitely going to swap the axel over when we get to somewhere I can work on the trailer comfortably. I was going to rotate it 90degrees if it wasn’t able to be straightened. All the best Carl.
Always things to fix.
Bananas?! 😮😁 Xx
🍌 🥹