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Up Topic American Welding Society Services / Technical Standards & Publications / Anybody done this to a set of rims?
- - By jwright650 (*****) Date 07-12-2007 19:29
I just bought a set of 9" wide "steel" rims with the correct back spacing to fit up under my 70 camaro. What I was looking to do is part the wheels on a lathe at a flat spot and add 1 1/2" band to them and make them 10 1/2" wide. Just looking for any advice if anyone has done this already and can save me some time.

Here is a pic where someone in our car club had his widened by a shop in the Mid-West.
Parent - - By Mwccwi (***) Date 07-13-2007 04:06
Do the wheels still ride true or is there vibration? I tried to modify some rims for a trailer a while back and they worked good up to 60 mph then began to vibrate.
Parent - By jwright650 (*****) Date 07-13-2007 13:11
My buddy hasn't experience any vibes, and he pushes his car pretty hard...LOL

I was planning on making a fixture to fit them up in, to keep them true. I have an old spindle and hub that I was going to put in the bench vise, and then spin them by hand and use a dial indicator to help me watch for any wobble or out of roundness as I fit the 1.5" band in there.

I dunno, they look too pretty all powder coated to go and cut them up....LOL, I'm getting chicken in my old age. I'm still on the fence.
Parent - By DaveBoyer (*****) Date 07-13-2007 05:32
I never tried anything like that, but remember My Grandpop's motto : "If somebody else can, I guess I can too".
Parent - - By Bob Garner (***) Date 07-16-2007 17:31
I remember way back, I think in the '50s, guys would take split two wheels at the widest point on the flat spot away from the inner rim on one and farthest away from the outer rim on the other, then weld them together into a wide single wheel.  That way it only required a single circumferential weld.  But it takes two wheels to make one.

Bob
Parent - By Milton Gravitt (***) Date 07-16-2007 19:21
Yes I've have seen them welded up like that before but this was in the 70's. The person that weld the rim used a 3/32 7018 rod and the man ran the rim as tubeless.
Parent - - By Bob Garner (***) Date 07-16-2007 19:49
Just some more rambling:

I bought some 15x8 steel rims with 4" backspacing from Pete Paulsen's house of wheels a few years ago.  I was running 275's on them for my '68 Olds.  I just found out you can't get 275x15 tires anymore so I'm going to have to go to custom 17"x8" steel wheels from Stockton Wheel (stocktonwheel.com).  As you can see, I prefer steel wheels.

What size of tires are you thinking of?  I'd like to put something like that under Mama Cass (my car's name).

Bob
Parent - - By jwright650 (*****) Date 07-17-2007 12:20
This whole thing started as an upgrade in my 1970 braking system. I modified the front spindles


and adapted C5 Corvette calipers to the front and made brackets to hang the calipers on the rear


and used the Corvette rotors which are 12.8" in the front and 12" in the rear.

After all this was ironed out, the 15" Z28 five spoke rims would not go over the calipers. So I moved up to a 17" rim. The 17" rim from Cragar is the Soft 8, and doesn't come in widths to accommodate a 315/35/17, but the 9" rim has the correct offset and I was planning to just add 1.5" to the backspacing to make the rim 10.5" wide to accept that large tire.

But for now, I have 275/40/17's on the 9" rim on the rear, and 255/40/17's on the 8" rim up front.
Parent - - By Bob Garner (***) Date 07-18-2007 14:32
John,

Nice brake adaptation.  Did you have any drawings to follow for the parts or did you custom measure and fit?

Ya gonna make kits available?  Watch out Stainless Steel Brake Company!

Regards,

Bob
Parent - - By jwright650 (*****) Date 07-18-2007 15:10
Check out Kore3.com, I made some brackets that are very similar to theirs, except mine were cut by hand and theurs were cut on a plasma burning table. I have a pdf of the brackets, if you are interested(I'll have to dig to see if it is on this computer though). The front brackets utilize the dust cover mounting holes, that are drilled/tapped to accept 1/2x13 bolts. The rear brackets will fit any 10 or 12 bolt rear, I utilized the bolt pattern off of the drum brakes backing plate. Then the C5 calipers just bolt on.
Parent - - By Bob Garner (***) Date 07-18-2007 15:37
I got around to checking out the Cragar Soft 8 wheels.  They're just what I was looking for to put under the Olds - thanks for turning me on to them.  I would love to go to the 315's like you are, but out of practicality I will stick with whatever will fit on the stock Cragars.

Did you check with Stocton Wheel about building a set of custom wheels for you.  This is what I was going to do before you told me about the Cragars.

Thanks again.

Bob
Parent - By jwright650 (*****) Date 07-18-2007 17:57
Bob,
I'm using a 17 x 8 with 4.5" of backspace for the front with Sumi HZR II 255/40/17 tires and 17 x 9(for now) with 5" of back space for the rear with Sumi HZR II 275/40/17 tires. I got the tires at TireRack.com to my door in 2 days and great pricing. I want to hurry up and get this car back on all fours again, so I'm delaying my widening project a bit, at least until I wear out the 275's and order some 315's to replace them.....LOL
Parent - - By Sourdough (****) Date 07-16-2007 19:53
NEATO!!

I don't see why not!

You have to be accurate most times in our profession, why couldn't you be close enough with a set of wheels??
Parent - - By Sourdough (****) Date 07-16-2007 19:59
I did away with the stock duels on my 69 c-30 Chevy. I put single 16x12's on the rear, but had to use the waterjet to fab spacers for the extreme deep dish Centerlines. We actually duplicated the bolt pattern on the reverse side of the spacers, so that everything bolts together, instead of having a loose piece of steel inbetween the wheel and hub. Worked good. I also did the same thing for the mismatched flywheel to u-joint bolt pattern on the jet drive of my boat.
Parent - - By MDG Custom Weld (***) Date 07-26-2007 12:55
Hay SD, how is that water jet working for you?  We currently have a plasma/ oxy-fuel cutting system we use for all of the custom burn outs, but I've been thinking about getting a water jet to increase the cut quality.  How do you think the water jet stacks up?
Parent - - By aevald (*****) Date 07-26-2007 15:19
Hello MDG Custom Weld, I believe you will find that the waterjet will really shine where distortion from thermal cutting processes is an issue. I don't believe that when comparisons are run as to cost effectiveness, that a waterjet will always be the best choice. Yet, when you compare edge finish and angularity between a plasma cut and that of a waterjet, the waterjet will provide a superior part, in my opinion. I really feel that a waterjet shines when processing stainless or aluminum parts and especially aluminum. Just my $.02. Regards, aevald
Parent - - By MDG Custom Weld (***) Date 07-26-2007 17:19
Allen, your comments are appreciated.  As we get into tighter tolerance needs, the plasma takes a lot more time to set up the kerf to make the required dimensions.  The problem is justifying the capitol for the equipment.
Parent - - By aevald (*****) Date 07-26-2007 17:46
Hello again MDG Custom Weld, as with any of the technology nowadays, it is as they say "not cheap" for the most part. Laser is a great way to go too, although I still feel that the waterjet does a better job of cutting the aluminum in many cases. You should probably try to do some research to see just what the operational costs are of the various processes and also look at the benefits of using one process over another one on the types of materials that you typically work with. Consumables, reliability, initial price, service availability, and other issues could be a deciding factor for your choice. New or used can also be an option, but here again, you don't want to buy someone elses headache so buyer beware. One other thing I might throw out there for you would have to do with your initial need for this technology. Do you typically build specific types of items that are fairly repetitive or do you do a lot of one-offs and custom types of fabrications? I ask, because there are a lot of materials providers and processors that offer cutting services that will allow you to call them up and request parts that they have on CAD files that you have provided to them that represent your specific parts. This can be much more cost effective than investing in a system that may take many years to pay for itself. Just a thought. Regards, Allan
Parent - By Sourdough (****) Date 07-26-2007 20:23
You guys let me know if my waterjet can be of assistance......
Parent - - By Sourdough (****) Date 07-26-2007 20:27
There is no comparison between the plasma and jet. We sometimes even get contracted to cut parts for nuclear reactors. We're talking three one thousands of an inch accuracy. Try to do that with heat cutting. Plus you can cut anything under the sun with the water jet. Stone, glass, tile, rock, steel, brass, aluminum, glass, your finger.......you get the idea.

No heat distortion whatsoever, just precision cuts.
Parent - - By DaveBoyer (*****) Date 07-27-2007 03:41
What thickness range can You cut with the water jet? I know it really shines on thinner material.
Parent - - By aevald (*****) Date 07-27-2007 04:13
Hello DaveBoyer, I received some scrap here a while back, it was 2" 304 ss, it had been cut with a waterjet. I'm sure it's like any of the other process, they can do thicker and more precise cutting as the dollars go up. Just a comment to ponder. Regard, aevald
Parent - - By DaveBoyer (*****) Date 07-28-2007 04:31
At the plant We had an old Airco line tracer with torches. Obviously not as acurate as a waterjet reading a CAD file but it worked great on heavy plate. Up to 6" was no problem at all, but the centralized oxy system was set at 60 PSI, and there was no high pressure line to the burning shed. We had plate on hand pretty much every common size to 12" but over 6" required manifolded cylinders, a real pain in the ass.
How much taper is there on a 2" waterjet cut? Does the machine compensate and give a square cut on the finish side?
Parent - - By aevald (*****) Date 07-28-2007 05:56
Hello DaveBoyer, on the particular piece that I mentioned in the post previously the parts were cut out with no taper and of course no heat lines, that is what caught my eye. When I first saw this it didn't dawn on me as to the process that had been used to make the parts. Then I took a closer look and noticed, as I said, that there were no heat lines and the cut edges were very square and had very straight and smooth surfaces. I have done a bit of reading and research on waterjet technology and it is definitely an up and coming process that will see much more use and application in the future I'm sure. A while back there was an article in one of the Welding Journals discussing the use of portable waterjet technology for the scrapping out of old fuel storage tanks, since there wasn't heat involved and if proper precautions were taken to allow for static charges this was ideally suited to this task. I also understand that different mediums can be added to the cutting water to allow for better cutting performance and speed on different types of materials. Hopefully some of the waterjet engineers or users will chime in here and enlighten us all a bit more. Regards, aevald
Parent - By DaveBoyer (*****) Date 07-29-2007 05:31
I was given a little handout souvineer, a profile of a bicycle cut out of 3/16 stainless. The elements are quite fine, about 1/32". There is a noticable taper to the cut surfaces, as the elements look wider on 1 side compaired to the other. This could be compensated for by tilting the jet a little bit on a strate cut, but to go around shapes requires the machine to keep the torch tilted in an axis perpendicular to the travel. Wire EDM machines have incorporated this technology for over 30 years, but it does add cost and complicaes the machine, as it is no longer just 2 axes. I was wondering if they have gone to this method YET.
Parent - By Sourdough (****) Date 07-29-2007 07:13
5 Inches of steel, within 3/1000's accuracy.........for real!
Up Topic American Welding Society Services / Technical Standards & Publications / Anybody done this to a set of rims?

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