The Stovebolt Site Forums The Parking Lot Big Bolts Widow Maker story

Back when I was in high school,(in the early 70s). I had a class mate that worked at a Firestone tire store, He had a widow maker rim come apart and catch him in the fore head. Besides disfiguring him it changed his personality. What a way to start your life at 16 or 17 years old. Liked your reply John!

That's a sad, and far too common story, about those RH-5's. I'm sure the Firestone engineers thought they were on to something at the time, though.

Engineers ...

Thanks Chris!

In the early 80s I worked at a construction company. My boss was always running around doing 5 things at once. He was airing up a truck tire for 1 of the trucks. It was laying on the floor and so he could go outside and do something else he used a clip on air nozzle that actually clipped on the valve stem. He went outside to do something and forgot it was airing up. I was outside at the time luckily. That tire blew the ring off and I think it hit everything in the shop!

Back when I was driving my bus and could still somewhat find guys who'd work on its widow makers, seemed like every one of 'em had a story of how one of these wheels put a guy's hand in his back pocket for him (to quote one of the techs). I'm not sure yet how original these are gonna look on my bus, but here's how to not have this issue anymore, if you intend to drive the rig..

Check out Buy Truck Wheels. This link goes directly to the ones I bought. Set of six, they were $298 apiece.

Lots of misinformation and outright ignorance regarding RH5 wheels. I've taken wheels and tires to so called tire shops and they didn't know the difference between RH5's and split ring wheels. "If it is a 20 inch wheel it is automatically a widow maker" (RH5) My 72 sees very little use, less than 1,000 miles a year, the cost of 7 new 22.5 wheels ($329 each) plus 7 tires (~$300 each) =$6,000 plus is cost prohibitive. I always wondered if anyone made adapters that allowed mounting the large diameter bolt circle steel wheels to be bolted on our older trucks. These semi wheels are commonly available locally for $25-$50. Anyone know of a source for such an adapter?

$

I made my own with ‘60’s 10 on 8.75” wheels. Wheel on left.

Ed

Happy Birthday, Ed!!

John, thanks!

Ed

I only had one set of RH-5's ever and they were on a '62 GMC 4000. When they needed airing up on the truck, I was extremely cautious. The truck came with a spare wheel, no tire on it and was pretty rusty. I got the brilliant idea of having it sand blasted. Once I got it back, I sure did not like how it looked and threw it in the scrap pile. This was in the old days before I knew much about these wheels, but common sense told me to get rid of it, lol. Very poor design.

You could buy a tire hammer and a couple of levers and do it yourself.Way cheaper than investing in tubeless wheels and tires. It's just brute force not rocket science.

Many years ago I didn't have 2 nickles to rub together and couldn't afford to have somebody changing my tires. At that time I was working at the IH truck shop as a general mechanic and that meant changing tires too. The shop had had a fire and lost many tools in it. So one payday when the Mac Tool man came around, I bought a couple of tire levers and a 20 lb. slide hammer which I still have to this day. They work on split rims, assorted tractor tires and others. I have never encountered an RH-5, just Budds, other split rim wheels, Chevrolet 3-piece wheels and various tubeless tires. Later, when I worked for a hay company the boss made the drivers fix their own flats. I suppose that made us drivers more careful around the nail infested barnyards. Those trucks all had 20-inch Budd wheels.

Another time in Garrison Junction MT on old US 10, I was asleep in the sleeper while my co-driver went into to the cafe for coffee and pie. He'd parked right next to the tire shop and I about hit the ceiling of the sleeper when a tremendous bang happened followed by several seconds of silence followed by the sound of a 20-inch wheel landing on the tin roof right next to where we were parked. Of course I had to get up and investigate along with everybody in the cafe.

The tire man had not been paying attention and mounted a 22.5 tire on a 20-inch split-rim wheel and aired it up with a clip-on air chuck (good thing that) sitting flat on the floor rather than in a cage. Those came later. Good thing.

A tire jockey at a service station across the road from the place I worked part time as a mechanic decided he could put a 14" tubeless tire on a 14.5" mobile home wheel by putting a tube in it. When the tire blew off the rim it took a good sized chunk of his right wrist with it- - - -he was holding the air hose in his right hand. The tire leaving the rim sounded like a bomb going off!
Jerry

Something similar happened at a tire shop where I was working, one of the techs accidentally put a 16" tire onto a 16.5" rim. When he aired it up, thankfully still on the machine so it couldn't jump around, it broke the bead of the tire with a terrific BANG. Never before or since seen the actual steel bead of a tire break, but thankfully no one was injured. Scared the poor guy half to death!

A 16" tire on a 16.5" rim must have been a tight fit, although 16.5 rims have a pretty wide taper on them. The force of the bead trying to expand as it was pushed up that taper probably did the deed. He might have weakened the bead stretching it over the rim, also.

All the "XX.5" tubeless rims have a very steep angle flange at the bead area, and a deep drop center. A straight bead tire goes onto the rim pretty easily, but unless a tube is used, it's very difficult to get the tire to hold air. One of the "Cheetah" tanks can blow enough of an air blast into the tire to get it to stick to the rim, but I've never seen one survive to normal inflation pressure without breaking the bead wires or blowing the tire off the rim if it's slightly misaligned. Deadly dangerous when it lets go!
Jerry

What size tire are you mounting on these wheels? Referencing the tubeless wheels shown earlier in the thread.