Alternative Rear Tandem Wheels

I know I know - another tire wheel thread LOL

But I've read probalby a hundred different wheel threads and not found an answer :

I want to stick with duals in the rear, but ideally it would be nice to have two piece rims that are capable of mounting tubeless tires. Never even heard them hinted at in all those threads ...

If not two piece rims, then how about one-piece rims ???

I know about the M135 rims, but the info I found was that these are NOT for duals. I also saw a thread or two about some 60's Ford rims (fit 22.5 OverTheRoad truck tires - found on some school bus ?) which have the 6 lug pattern that will fit the Deuce, but did not see anything about them being duals friendly.

So if I want to run duals in the rear, I HAVE to stick with the military standard split rims and tires with tubes in them ???

No ifs, ands, or buts - this is the last word on this subject ???



Edit - OK I'm a bonehead - I meant running in a duals configuration - got tandems and duals mixed up - fixed it, but cant fix the thread title.

Find yourself some 6 lug stud pilot 22.5 rims, most medium duty fords used them. I converted over to them a few months ago and love it. Yes the 22.5 are "tandem friendly" and much easier and cheaper to get rubber for.

sodslinger - did use these in a duals setup on the rear axles ?

And are you running tubeless ?

edit - sorry I got tandems and duals mixed up.

wheel type definitions : http://www.stovebolt.com/techtips/wheels/

OK - found a site with new wheels - specs appear to work :

Here are the standard deuce wheel specs :

Titan T-Hawk 9.00x20 9.00-20 Military Tread Tire and 20x7.5 Military Wheel with ring Duece and A Half Truck Wheel and Tires 2 1/2 Ton Truck wheels and tires Military Trailer tires and wheels M35A1 M35A2 M44A1 M44A2 M602

Here is a site that sells truck wheels that look like they fit :

http://www.accuridewheels.com/studpilot.pdf

part number 28157 at the very end of the document


Any wheels experts out there ? Would these fit on a Deuce ?

Sodslinger has a point with the price and availability of fresh (new) tires rather than tires that are recent or who knows how old, but if your thinking big fatty mudder type tires, I think you'll find nominal sizes for 22.5's The 22.5's will be available for years to come due to the popularity of them.
Excelent price on the T Hawks ABOVE ^^^

Well here is a thread on the subject that I dug up from 2005 :

http://www.steelsoldiers.com/deuce-...-what-do-you-do-fit-radials-your-truck-2.html

It appears that 1960's to 1970's Ford F-600's used 22.5 single piece wheels to fit the Deuce and so did some of the older Hino box trucks, some used by FedEx and some by UPS.

I'm pursuing this because I want to have as reliable a Deuce as possible within a reasonable price. And most of the alternative tire arrangements that we see on SS are mostly SuperSingles and setup mostly for offroad. The other common move seems to be keeping the NDT tires. To me these look like good choices as long as you don't spend much time on pavement.

Using the 22.5 wheels/tires combo has a lot of advantages :

1) tubeless
2) better mileage
3) longevity (some of the NDT users here talked about wearing tires out in 5000 miles) 100,000 miles is not unusual for standard truck tires
4) taller = 55 mph
5) safety (steel belted radials + no split rims + better road traction)
6) maintenance (no tubes + easy for tire shop to change)
7) lots of tire selection/availability since these are standard OTR truck tires

Anyways I am going to keep searching.

If you go tubeless you want a one piece wheel and not a split ring. While they did make some split ring tubeless wheels they had a o-ring that can cause problems and be hard to seal. 22.5 in tubless is a direct replacement for a 20 tube type. They are easy to change also as long as you have a couple of tire irons.

I paid 70 a rim used at a local salvage yard. 22.5 tubeless and i couldn't be any happier. They look original yet makes the truck handle and drive much better and offered a better cruising speed. i run virgin highway tread on the fronts and a more aggressive re-treads on the rears.

Sodslinger - how did you specify which wheels you wanted to the salvage yard guys ? i.e. did you just ask them for Ford medium duty rims or what ?

Here is a pretty good video on how to change standard trcuk tires by hand : amazing how easy this guy makes it look - this is a Michelin video "Proper Mounting Techniques using T-45 Tire Irons"

Michelin Americas Truck Tires Videos and Demos Page

Everyone keeps saying how easy it is to change the two piece rims, but that didn't look much harder than a lot of bicycle tires I had to do.

I told my guys i wanted ( 6 lug stud piloted 22.5 tubeless rims) commonly found on medium duty fords. My local company and they told me no problem! I never change my own tires anyway, the tire guys do all that stuff.

kochevnik said:

http://www.michelintruck.com/michelintruck/toolbox/videos-demos.jsp

Everyone keeps saying how easy it is to change the two piece rims, but that didn't look much harder than a lot of bicycle tires I had to do.

Click to expand...

IMO the one piece wheels are easier to change if you have a set of tire irons and a duckbill hammer. Seems the bigger the tire the easier it is to change when it comes to one piece wheels.

m16ty said:

IMO the one piece wheels are easier to change if you have a set of tire irons and a duckbill hammer. Seems the bigger the tire the easier it is to change when it comes to one piece wheels.

Click to expand...

Yes the bigger the easier, leave in in the sun for a few hours first and its almost to easy.

O.K., What size 22.5 tire is the same as the 9:00 x 20 with repsect to the O.D.?
And what compares to the 11:00 X 20 tire whcih is better for on the road?
Thanks,
Jim

Sodslinger : that's probably one of the most useful pieces of info I've found on this board - thanks for that. By any change do you have a spare wheel you could take some measurements on ? Or could you tell us what tire size you used that worked well with those wheels ?

According to the info I have from these sites & looking at the new rims I found on Accuride's website (6.75 inch rim width), the rims are a bit too narrow for the 'approved rims' width and the minimum dual spacing :

Army Military Tires

http://www.gpxtire.com/userTireSearch.do?reqCode=describe&tireApplicationId=6&id=410

http://www.bfgoodrichtrucktires.com/bfgtruck/tires/tireInfo.do?tread=DR424



Jim the info you were looking for is on these sites as well.

I never thought so much about tires in my life LOL - here is some good info about Static Load Radius - which is used (not tire diameter) when comparing tires :

Truck Gears, Axle Ratios, and Gearing Formula - 4 Wheel and Offroad Magazine

To find the true height of the tire, you need to measure the static-loaded radius and then double it. This measurement is taken from the road surface to the center of the axle or hub while the vehicle is on the ground. When this measurement is doubled, you get the diameter of the tire as the engine and driveline see it. If we use the same numbers as before, we might find that the 30-inch tires have a static-loaded radius of 14-1/2 inches. Doubling it gives us a 29-inch true height. The 33s may have a static-loaded radius of 15-3/4 inches or a true height of 31-1/2 inches.

Click to expand...

So according to my math - if you are going 50 mph in a Deuce on the standard 900R20 tires and you switch to 1100R20 or 12R22.5 then you would be going 53.5 mph. If you switched to 395-85R20 then you would be going almost 57 mph (which incidentally is above the max rating for the tire - 55 mph).

And switching to the 11R22.5 would be 51.9 mph.

For myself I was looking for a 22.5 tire that would go 55 mph instead of 50 mph with the 900R16's and it looks like the closest would be the 13R22.5 which has a loaded radius of 20.5 which give 54.8 mph or 55.9 mph on te second link (20.9 SLR) -

Home of Arata Equipment Company

Welcome to China Manufacturers Alliance (CMA, LLC), Official Double Coin Tire Manufacture, OTR & MTR Specialist


BUT the rims for these are supposed to be 10 inches. So we need a tire as tall as a 13R22.5 but a lot narrower. I'll be searching more.

added : good description of duals spacing on page 26 of this document :

http://www.kellytires.com/commercial/promos/service_manual_2004.pdf

And let me add this info - Super Singles improve fuel economy :

Michelin Americas Truck Tires Press Releases Page

and page 71 of the Kelly Tires document above.

Fuels economy with Super Singles is 6 to 10 percent better than duals on OTR trucks and trailers.

IMHO... if you find a good tire dealer (read - real truck tire dealer) they should be able to mount all 10 of your tires included in the total price...

Living up here in Maine I figured I could get a deal on the tires I wanted (10.00 X 20 Good Year G-177's) online or out of state.... Well, Freightliner of Maine not only beat every price out there (not to mention that I got the last 11 in the east coast), BUT included rim protectors and tubes and jacked the whole truck up in the air and did all 10 tires at once while I waited... pretty slick. Took the 2 guys about 45 minutes... well worth it. It was nice to see how pros do it, and peace of mind about what kind o' can o' worms laid in wait once the rims were exposed for the first time in like 30 years...

I tried the spare tire at home trying to break the bead with the hydraulic stabilizer arm of my log loader.... you think the foot would have broke the bead really easy - slick easy... well it only resulted in tearing the tire apart... the bead was so rusted to the rim, I had to cut it off with a grinder!!! and then I imagined 10 more like that!!!

There are plenty of 20" tires out there that aren't the super single variety, you just need to know what to look for.

I didn't want super singles. I needed security of load support. I didn't want to go to the 11.00 X 20 either and work the engine too hard hauling, but needed more meat on the wheels than the 9.00's had to offer.... 10.00 X 20 fit the bill, pricey - yes - but they are the last tires the truck will ever need and have an inch of tread depth to handle most anything I will ever encounter!

Good input RangerDave - so you are using 10.00R20 on the original military split rims ?

And the Freightliner guys didn't have any problem with changing the split rims ?

I see the SLR on those is 19.6 so in my example above - 50 mph on the standard deuce becomes 52.4 on the 10.00R20 tires.

http://www.shopsttc.com/showcaseprintproductdetail.htm?productId=5617188

Do you get a large number of flats? Constantly changing tires? Having started driving "large cars" nearly 40 years ago, I have never had any problems running trucks with split rim mounted tires. I haven't had a handful of flats in all those years on the big trucks. Tubeless are great, I like them but, I don't lose sleep over owning /driving trucks that don't have them. I singled my one deuce and like the tubeless 11R20 Michelin XZL tires on tubeless rims. They are 43" overall diameter, load range H, 20" loaded radius, with a 65mph speed rating. I liked them so much I put them on my other deuce in duals. I bought 11.00 radial tubes and they fit the stock split rim very well. I would like to try a set of 365/80R20's on the singled truck.