Yet another widowmaker replacement thread. I found that the old military 6x6 trucks (deuce and a half ) were outfitted with 6x8.75 bolt pattern wheels. Is there anyone that has used these before and do they work? I haven't found any info on this yet, apologize if it's been answered before!

 

We've had several guys swap their widow makers for military surplus 20"ers having Goodyear style locking side ring rims. Same stud piloted 6 x 8.75" pattern. They work well. Stu

 

Excellent, thank you!

 

All 6 of my wheel are lock ring milsurp. Work great. Give them respect they deserve.

 

Looks awesome! Thanks for the replies.

 

So I bought 6 wheels off an old military truck. The fronts fit well, but the tires on the rears touch each other well before the second dually rim reaches the stud. Do I need special spacers for the rear wheels?

 

If you're gonna use the military NDT tires I'll assume they are 9.00" x 20". That's pretty wide. If the wheels don't have enough offset to dual them up then spacers between the rears is a solution. Stu

 

they are 11x20 actually. I'll probably need longer studs too

 

My dad had a couple M211 GMCs with those wheels. The military ran them as a M135 with single 11.00x20s, and M211 with duals using 9.00x20s.

Dual 11.00s is not a good idea imo. Any fooling with stud length or spacers risks adding enough stress to the axle housing to cause it to fail.

I don't know how you would get 11.00s under an F600 anyway. Our '58 had 8.25s and with a load those were about right. IIRC, 9.00s would have been a maybe, and 11.00s would have hit the bottom of the bed.

ymmv.

Good luck with it.

 

I bought new 8.25-20 tires for front. I am using the 9.00-20 NDT on rear, fits fine

 

Ah I see! The truck isn't used to heavy haul anymore. I just have a camper that weighs 1500lb and that's about the most weight that will be on it. I have a custom flat deck I built so the tires do clear just fine. I'd like to run duals just because I think it looks weird with a single rear. Right now I'm just running one on each side. Is there any way I could space these out safely or is that pretty much impossible?

 

I'm on the road and away from the books so can't look the 11" tires up. Like said earlier, I think they are too wide. Normal offset on a wheel is 5" or a little more. Dual spacing requirements on an 11" tire will be extreme. I'll look it up later and comment. Stu

 

Thanks for checking into that for me stu. This is how it currently sits. Looks a little weird with singles on the back

 

11s is big:

http://carphotos.cardomain.com/ride_...1_original.jpg

I think yours are slightly bigger than the military ndts.

 

This started with a simple yes/no type question, and I believe will close with a yes/no answer to the followup question.

Starting with the wheels, the easy part was knowing that the 6 x 8.75" military and civilian bolt patterns were equals. Having now gone deeper, I find record of six wheels on which the military or civilian markets could have used an 11R20" radial or 11-20" bias ply tire. Two Accuride and four Budds.

The first Accuride is their #26357. It is 20" x 7.5", stud piloted, has 6.25" of positive offset, and has a "Military Standard" / "MIL STD" rim/ring design. It is listed as ORD 7389621 for the complete wheel and ring, ORD 7389620 for wheel w/o the ring, and ORD 7389061 for the ring alone.

The other Accuride is their number 27101-C. It is 20" x 7.5", hub piloted, has 6 5/16" positive offset, and has either the Firestone FL-2 or FL-3 two or three piece rim/ring sets.

The first of the Budds is their number R66280-8. It is 20" x 7.5", stud piloted, has 5 1/8" of positive offset, and has the "MIL STD" rim/ring. It alone in all these is listed as sold only to the military. Why is unclear. The "R" means radial tire approved.

The next is R69890-8 described as 20" x 7.5", stud piloted, and having 6.25" of positive offset. Again a MIL STD rim/ring.

Next is R66640-3, stud piloted, 20" x 7.5", 2.5" of positive offset, and having a Goodyear LB rim/ring.

Last is R93470-3, 20" x 7.5", hub piloted, having 3 9/16" of positive offset. It has a Goodyear LW rim/ring design.

Now for the 11" tires. Both radial and bias ply have an 8" "Design Rim Width". They are approved for use on flat base rims that are 7.5", 8.0", 8.5", and 8.50VM". Don't find what differentiates a "VM", but it doesn't matter. Both have a "Section Width" of 11.55", and "Growth Max Width In Service" of 12.47". They have "Minimum Dual Wheel Spacing" of 13.2".

Doubling the offset figure for each wheel must yield a figure equal to or greater than the dual wheel spacing figure for the tires. If your wheels were the 6.25" offset variety you could probably mount duals by adding a small spacer. But given your statements my guess is you found the 5 1/8" variety Budds. Which I fear means duals are not in the cards unless you change tires.

All this is from old print catalogs. Budd is gone, absorbed into the Hayes Lemmerz conglomerate with K-H and Motor Wheel. I'll look online at the Accuride catalogs to see if any newer versions exist. I would guess that the Accuride or Budd numbers will be stamped on your wheels to tell us what you have. If you find other numbers I'll dig deeper, or if I find online something different I'll edit. Stu

Edit - only Accuride catalogs that are on-line are for 2011, 2013, 2015, and 2016. Nothing older that I find. The #26357 that is in my 3/91 paper catalog is obsolete with no substitute number by 2011. Stu