Hi Grigg, I appreciate all the effort you've put into these couple of help threads. Very useful stuff.
What iam trying to achieve is to rid my life of these pox ridden 10 on 7.25 pattern wheels forever.
Over the last 12 months I have been backwards and forwards trying to come up with a solution to the "wheel" dilemma. the original 20 inch tubed tyres just arn't feasible. I have approached companies all over the planet to make me some new barrels and weld in my stock hubs. What ever tyre/wheel combo you go to needs to be a similar diameter to make the final drive ratios work. I ended up buying a full set of 22.5 x 7.5 10on 286 alcoas and test fitting 1 with a 255/70/22.5 This is the same diameter as a 7.50x20 but they end up 5inches wider in the back as a dually and in my opinion are just a fraction too big for good proportion for the truck. I reckon a 225/70/19.5 is probably a really good size tyre wheel combo or a 22 inch rim with some low profile tyres but this messes up the final drive ratio and will scream its tits off.
So, what are the problems?! the stock 10 on 7.25 stud pattern sucks balls. no one any where has a set of wheels,
If I spend a packet getting the wheel adaptors made(approx. 3500 including hardware) they are illegal here in Australia and with the wheels being so much wider on the rear will probably stand out like tits on a bull and attract some flies.
I cant source Brake drums for the rear.
very limited diff ratios available. I have a 5.43 and a 6.17.
all in all, its starting to hurt my head.
I want to maintain the light commercial weight rating of the truck so what ever happens needs to have similar "ratings" as the stock units.
A complete drive line swap from a 3500hd seems like the go but am still stuck with those pox ridden 10 on 7.25 stud pattern
It really needs to be a 8 on 6.5 to have good wheel tyre options available

So what ive come up with is a dana 80 from a 3500 dodge dually(same as the 3500hd but with 8 on 6.5). They have a heap of gear ratios for them(dana 80). any where from high 3's to mid 5's, and was looking at the front end of one of my brothers 78 f250's. The Ford run the double I beam front end but still attach via the same king pin assembly. They have something like 16 inch disc brakes and have the little wheel spacer on the end of the axle like the stock 2t unit has so the wheel to wheel width would be pretty close to standard width. They have a 1.05 king pin with an I beam end pretty close to that of the stock 2t unit (about 3 inches).so I am thinking if I get a custom made I beam end bush, the entire assembly should bolt straight up using stock f350 parts. The steering components are in the correct position also.
That would give 4 wheel disc brakes and be able to maintain the standard handbrake pull mechanism. obviously I will need to upgrade the master cylinder and booster but it will need to be done sooner or later when it runs out of brake drums.

I like the idea of the p30 setup but would have to be the 8 on 165 stud pattern to have some wheel options and we don't really have many of them here in Australia. When I say not many... I mean none.
Spare parts need to be accessible or life just becomes too hard.

Last edited by Digga1111; 10/03/2018 6:47 AM.