WIDOW MAKER welded into modern tubeless 22.5 rim blank
Hi All...I spent all of yesterday with my friend Lyman. Lyman retired from the City of San Diego about 2 years ago as a large equipment mechanic....Specifically he repaired Fire apparatus. I called Lyman just to check in with him. He hadnt heard from me since just before Christmas when I called before going on my end of the year vacation. My wife and I went to Mexico to do a multiple celebration type of thing. We arrived a few days before Christmas and celebrate that , our 20th wedding anniversary and New Years there. In beautiful Nuevo Vallarta Mexico....weather was in the 80's the whole time....Its beautiful there....came back bronzed....
Lyman asked what I was doing calling him at 10am when I should be working...I told him I was headed to Parkhouse Tire here in San Diego. The shipping company was delivering the two wheels I had done for Ethyl *THE* Tool Truck to them directly from in AWS= American Wheel Specialists Kennewick Washington. I had removed the two outside duals JUST before leaving on vacation on December 21st and had those two wheels broken down by Parkhouse. I then put some cardboard around them and shrink wrapped each wheel and used my Fedex ground account to send the wheels up to AWS. They had them by Thursday 12/27 I was hoping to have them with those old wheel centers welded into the modern rim blank tubeless 22.5's back by the time I came home 2 weeks later on Jan 5th. It took until the 14th....Im sure Christmas, New Years etc played a part in the time it took to turn this around. I spent the week doing stuff on the tool truck I meant to do but never had time...like organize it ....
Lyman on hearing that I was not working that day asked if he could come use the work area in the building I store Ethyl in....he was doing something with a gun he had and wanted to use the workbench there and my drift set again....I should sell him this set....this is the 2nd time he has had to use that 1/8th drift punch...Im just kidding there...he is alway welcome to do what he wants...He's a super good guy....Im proud to be his friend...ex Navy frogman---like he likes to say..."was a Navy Seal...a hundred pounds ago (an extra)"....
Lyman had ulterior motives.....he wasnt going to let me move all those (5) 200lb+ tires and wheels around by myself...I was moving the fronts to the left rear corner, and the remaining dual from that left corner to the outside of the right rear position. The two "new" AND VERY NICELY DONE BY AWS wheels are now equipped with 9Rx22.5 Firestone highway rib tread steel belted radials are up front...
Lyman arrived and I had just finished jacking up the rear of the truck. One of the things I did while I waited that week for my wheels to get done and get shipped to me was take the time to break free all the lug/lug fastening stuff on all the wheels so that when the new ones came I could jack the truck up and go to town removing wheels to move everything into their place. I dont have a 1" gun in stock....yet...I should have...dumb move not to...but my One inch breaker bar and floor jack handle extension set up did that trick.
We worked at doing all of that for 3 hours...It takes time to move those things around...about our only real rest break was the time we spent searching my repair manual for wheel torque specs....which we DID NOT FIND THERE. After calling Parkhouse and not getting the torque spec info from them...".Im not sure its an old Ford.".. A search of the internet proved Lyman correct....We Torqued the inner wheels duals and the front wheels to 450 ft lbs using his very nice torque wrench. We Torqued the two outside duals to 425....Lyman said you dont want the inside dual nut to loosen and come off before the outside nut is released and OFF so he suggested doing the insides a little tighter that the outside nut...there is a spec leaway so that made sense to me. I had to deal with the mess that occurs when that inner fastener nut stud unit loosens up when removing the outside dual's nut like he described on the other project "Edith," also a 1955 C600. , that I am in the process of resto modding onto a 2002 E550 power stroke etc Chassis....another story...Ill post stuff about that project eventually....one stock 1955 C600 and one restomod....Im a geek for these trucks.....and the bump F series also...Im in the process of getting my newest addition "Brutus" 1972 F250 Custom Sport ready to be my daily driver
In a couple of hours Ill head back to the building across town where I store both C600 trucks....I will go see my Tuesday customers for the first time in 4 weeks....hopefully the heavy rain that was with us yesterday will let up some...uncharacteristically it is forecasted to rain ALL week//Its no fun to go sell tools in the rain but I also need to go collect my MONEY!!!!

 

Good to know someone will do that.
Need a pic of the tool truck.

 

 

Nice truck!!

 

why thank you sir!......mostly original...except now its 12v and negative ground. pertronix. and wheel modification. liberties with paint scheme and color. and with tint of glass. box is off of a donor Matco tool truck circa 2005 box was built by ProVans,,,,still needs some more artwork. I want to have the Preamble to the Constitution scrolling across the front of the box where all that white is behind the cab....

 

why thank you sir!......mostly original...except now its 12v and negative ground. pertronix. and wheel modification. liberties with paint scheme and color. and with tint of glass. box is off of a donor Matco tool truck circa 2005 box was built by ProVans,,,,still needs some more artwork. I want to have the Preamble to the Constitution scrolling across the front of the box where all that white is behind the cab....

 

I wonder what AWS charged for the conversion. Was it cheaper than the new 6 lug 22.5 rims that can be purchased.. IIRC they were about 275-300 ea.. plus ship

Thanks
notme

 

Hi there....MY wheel is FIVE lug on 8 spacing....there is a new wheel for this also...they are UGLY in my opinion...ONLY 2 grab holes instead of the five of the oe for mine not sure what you are considering....AWS fee was $360 per wheel plus all the shipping etc to put my centers into their supplied 22.5 tubeless rim blank....I used my Tool biz FEDEX account to ship the hub biz part of the widowmaker to them and that cost me $40 per wheel. Once they were complete, AWS was able to ship the two wheels back on a pallet for $150. I still need to have 4 more done....I used Firestone rib tires because these two new wheels and tires are on the front of my truck....AWS did a good job of powder coating and got very close to the custom color of my bumper and my grille. I sent the wheels to them on Dec 21st and got them back Jan 14th....I was hoping they could have them back when I came back from my end of the year vacation on Jan5 .....had to be down an additional week....Sean and Chris and Corinda at AWS are excellent and will answer any questions etc...

 

Wait..what? I have that 5x8 pattern on my International, and was under the impression that my only option for modern rubber was trying to track down the 5 lug 19.5" motorhome wheels that were used on some larger motorhomes in the 70s, but even then there was apparently was several models, not all of which would fit over my brakes. I've yet to ever see one of these....I have the lock ring wheels, as opposed to the split rim wheels, so I'm not all that terribly concerned about it, but I've also never seen used 20" tires around here, whereas dirt cheap used 22.5s off of RVs are all over the place.

But there are new 22.5s available for our 5 lug pattern?

 

 

check with aws....on those new wheels....its been three years since I looked into them and I just never liked the look of them enough to be serious...I may have info on them somewhere just not sure where! I recall Sean at AWS informed me....

 

Deleted - turns out wheels don’t fit these fords.

 

I asked 1947 Stude for pictures, which he was good enough to send, and they are hub piloted. Not gonna work on a Ford unfortunately. Stu