hi people . . . I have a 51 f3 with 17" split rims. I love the look, but cannot deal with split rims. Anyone got any idea about what rims/tires I can stick on it to keep the look? thanks in advance!

 

Welcome to FTE.
If your truck has 8 bolt wheels/hubs I believe newer Ford F250 16'' rims from 1996 down will fit. My 53 M350 has 6 bolts rims so that doesn`t work for me and I am stuck with the 17'' rims.

 

Your stock 17" wheels are sometimes referred to as "Widow Makers" and most tire places won't touch them. You have three options, use 16" wheels from F-2 which will allow you to use stock hubcaps. You can achieve the same height with the 16" wheels as the 17" wheels by using taller tires. These rims are somewhat hard to find, like many parts for old vehicles. The second option, use a multipart wheel with a snap ring type retainer. You can find these on newer trucks into the '70s, you won't be able to use stock hubcaps with these. The third option is to use tubeless rims from a larger Ford pickup, they used the same bolt pattern up to the mid '80s, I think.

 

Some places refuse to work on the snap ring wheels and if they do they charge extra. One piece 16" wheels were optional on the 73-79 trucks and were used up to 1996.


This is what they look like on my '51 M-3.

 

I think the few places that now work on rims with snap rings are going to stop in the near future for the same reason as the "Widow Makers", liability. Plus there aren't any smaller truck, under 2 tons, the use them and I believe the larger trucks are also phasing them out.

If you want to use stock hubcaps the best bet would be the F-2 rims.

 

It is well worth the education of you can find a place that still does split rims, they have some neat safety cages they use. Anyway my understanding is also that the 8bolt pattern up to '97 works, remember the square style was built until '98 so '97 F250 and F350's will also have the correct rims. The '99+ SD's have a metric set and have hubcentric rims instead of lugcentric (flat washer lugnuts instead of the old style angles ones)

 

I agree on the F-2 rims but they are next to non-existent in Canada since we never got any 3/4 trucks from 45-52. The 53-56 F-250's I've seen also have that snap ring.

The killer of snap ring wheels is rust. I got some 16" dually rims with the ring and I'm going to eventually replace them with one piece ones.

Ford has used hub centric wheels since '85 on the F-350 and E-350's (probally on the 450 as well) but this is .

 

Nathan,

That's interesting, do you have any idea why you guys didn't get the 3/4 tons?

 

I think is was mostly due to a lack of a market after the war. Farmers always bought the 1 tons. I've seen lots more of the F-3's than the F-1's. I wonder what the actual cost difference was between the F-2 and F-3?

 

If you want to retain the taller rim, I know that tubeless 17.5s will also work. I've got two on one of my project trucks. The drawback is that they probably wouldn't be as easy to find as modern 16s, and tires wouldn't be as easy to find. But tires are still available in this size.

 

I know my F-3 project came with a set of the 16" F-2 rims. Since then I've scrounged up another matching 16 for a spare, plus made an incredible U-Pay find and have a set of 6 original F-2/3 hupcaps ($50.. 4 nice ones, 2 beat up but salavageable)

 

I didn't have any luck with the older 8 bolt rims on my 50 merc the drum was bigger from late 49 to early 51 when they went back to a 12" drum on the back I don't know if the f-3 ford was the same.
Glenn

 

thanks for the info!

I need to get it moving . . . I think I am going to use 16" rims and taller tires . . . maybe I'll get lucky and find a set of f2's locally . . .

thanks again!!

 

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I recently picked up a 1950 F3 and it has 8 lug 17's on it. I asked a friend who knows more than I do if they are split rims and he looked them over and said no they are solid rims. Does anyone know if Ford made 17" solid rims for these trucks? I had already picked up a set of 16" 8 lugs off a 80's ford van but if the 17's on the truck are indeed solid and not split I would stay with them. I would appreciate any info on this, thanks....

fifty2f1