The Stovebolt Site Forums The Shop Area General Truck Talk Tire Irons, I Need a Source

Anyone know where to get tire irons now a days? At $35 a shot to remove the old tire and mount the new one, I think I’m gonna learn how to change the tires on my split rims my self. Besides, what I save will pay for the tire irons.
Denny Graham
Sandwich, IL

Never mind, cheap old Harbor Freight comes through again with twenty three inche for $9.95 and three different styles.

Denny, see if Harbor Freight has a tire cage or whip one up yourself out of re-bar, rod, pipe, anything. Those split rims are fine when everything is straight and done right but sure have put alot of people in a hospital or worse.

Your talking above my head Evan, what's a tire cage? What are the dangers your cautioning me about? From the pictures in the Chevy Shop Manual it looks like it's all done by hand and pretty straightforward. The part that looks like it's would be the biggest problem is getting the tire bead off and on. The irons they show in the pictures look like 15" or 16" comparing them to the rim size. Now on the other hand, I wouldn’t even attempt to change a 6ply tubeless by hand, dealers can do that in two minuets and never even scratch the rim.
Most of the tire irons I found on the net are for motorcycle tires, 15” & 16” length, Harbor Freight's, tire irons are all 23", that should give me a little more help.
You mean to tell me, there aren’t any of you DIYers out there that change your own split rim tires? I'm gonna try one and if I run into to much of a hassle I'll probably end up taking the others in to the tire guy and spring for the $35 per. I can already invasion myself slicing up a $20 tube.
I hate to think of what my newly painted rims are gonna look like by the time I get it back together. I'll bet the tire dealer makes just as much of a mess when he mounts tires on a split rim. I don't believe they use any kind of tire machine for the slit rims, other than maybe a bead breaker to get the tire on and off.
In the Sinclair service station, we use to use a liquid soap to lub the tire bead, would that still accepted as OK? I’m sure that there are special lubs for this but it seems like plane old Palmolive should work just fine, and it washes right off also.
Denny Graham
Sandwich, IL

Just be very careful with those split rims. They will blow apart if everything is not lined up perfect.

The problem that is being referred to with split rims is if the split ring is not seated properly on the rim they are known to come off, when inflated. The results from a flying ring has been death. Be sure and wire brush the inside of the ring and the mateing surface on the rim clean, and then enclose the tire in a cage so if the ring does come lose it doesn't take your head off. If it wasn't for this unfortunate fact split rims would be nice to save a little money. There are tire service shops that won't even touch split rims, so you will need to carry those tire irons with you on trips just in case. Most folks these days trash the splits in favor of a newer set of rims.

You will also need a tire(?) hammer to break the bead. The hammer has a wedge on one end. It takes a little practice to get the wedge between the tire and the rim. You would be better off buying one of the tire machines that can lever the bead off the rim.

In the gas station I worked in we used Rio-glyde which is a rubber lubricant sold by NAPA. We also used it on shackle bushings and such.

Larry

Not quite sure if you fully understand the danger here. The large 15/16 inch diameter steel ring that comes off of the remainder of the wheel to allow the tire to slide off can literally blow off of the assembly when you are refilling the new tire with air. If this ring is not properly seated in the grove ALL THE WAY around it will very likely come off.

Now figure out the surface area of one side wall of the tire and multiply that by whatever pressure that you are going to inflate the tire to. You can easily get to over 15,000 pounds of force. If that steel ring comes off with that much force behind it and you just happen to have your arm in its path, (like when holding the air hose on the tire fill valve) You will be very lucky if a good doctor can reattach it. Let alone your head if you happen to be watching the valve stem area at the time.

The "cage" mentioned by COILOVER, is just that. It is a very substantial steel cage just large enough to place the tire and wheel inside. The top is chained or otherwise secured shut before re-inflating the tire. It is designed to catch and stop the ring when it comes off.

Many years ago we would place the tire and wheel assembly on the floor ring side down believing that this procedure would protect us. One day I was watching as a ring blew off lifting a 120 pound tire & wheel assembly 6 feet into the air. The guy filling the tire was badly bruised with several stitches. After that it was always a cage.

"Substantial steel cage" The ones i have seen and worked with are 2" heavy steel pipe. Also, my friend lost the use of his arm, permanently, with his hand inside the cage to inflate the tire.

Hey folks, that ring can come flying off on deflation also. You all need to deflate in a cage, too! If you are in the middle of nowhere, leave the rim on the vehicle while you deflate. Do your tire work, then remount to the vehicle, stand off to the side then reinflate. If you have a semi flat, make sure you totally deflate the tire before removing from the wheel from the vehicle.

After assembly, place the tire / wheel combo in a cage. Use a MINIMUM 3' hose tire chuck. Stand off at a 45 degree angle to the tire. That means, if you have an upright cage, don't stand directly in front of the cage and don't stand directly to the side of the cage.

I still remember the early training videos they used to show us. The one with the mannequin over the rim that they blew the ring off of. Its head went flying 20 feet higher than its body! Partial inflations, cage inflations! That mannequin looked worse than the crash test dummies when they were done!!

Your lucky to have found someone do it for $35.00, $140.00 for four wheels, that is a deal. Better than loss of life or limb.

This is a very real danger. A friend of mine was killed by a car tire exploding as he inflated it. Since then I use a clip on inflater valve and attach it with zero pressure. Then walk over to the compressor and turn the air on.

In lieu of a tire cage, you can wrap a heavy chain around the tire, looped through the center of the wheel, several times. Even with this, don't be near it while it's inflating.

One of the truck manuals, I think that it is the Chev manual, avoids mentioning the dangers completely. I was truly shocked to see this.

There are threads on this site with documented horror stories. They are very sad and scary indeed.

I have seen them inflated with the hoist arms sitting almost on top of the rim.

Denny, to answer your question.... try Tractor Supply.

Just change those split rims out and forget about it. Old trucks are fun until they kill you.

Here is some information dealing with split rims.They explain what to look for and what precautions should be used.The first link is a picture of a smaller type of tire cage"look for the tire cage link".The bars prevent the ring from hitting you,if it should pop off while inflating the tire.A lot of people have died from the rings hitting them.I had a neighbor years ago.He was changing the tires on a big rig that had split rims.The ring came off and tore half his face off.He amazingly lived and had lots of plastic surgery to over come his misfortune.Be careful,if you chosse to do it yourself.See the links below.


http://images.google.com/imgres?img...%3Dorg .mozilla:en-US:official%26sa%3DN

http://www.ccohs.ca/oshanswers/safety_haz/garages/split_rim.html

http://www.labour.gov.sk.ca/safety/bulletins/trucktireexplosions.pdf

We used to air them up under the arms of the in-ground car hoist. Log chain wrapped around many times also works. It is not hard to do, & may save a life. Brian

If you have never seen an improperly installed ring come flying off, then you can not fully understand the potential danger involved with split ring wheels....

Of course, if properly dis and reassembled, using the right tools/equipment, the dangers are minimalized.

Very informative guys, you do have my attention now. Don’t want anyone to think that I’m a know it all and that I’m not heading your warnings, I’m far from it, that’s why I’m asking these questions.
I can certainly see that a lot of care should be exercised in handling tire changes with split rims. I also feel with proper attention to detail and procedure that this can safely be done in a home shop. My tire dealer didn’t seem to have a problem with mounting tires on these. He is in farm country and does a lot of truck and tractor tires so I suppose he is used to split rims. We handle fire arms which are dangerous also but as long as the proper precautions are taken, we can enjoy the safe use of all these objects.
In looking the ring over I see the inside is oval shaped with a relief on opposite sides, in order to get the ring out of the gutter and back into it. Once your sure the ring is seated in the gutter and assuming it is not cocked, bent or stretched, if you bring up the air pressure gradually, I don’t see why it should come off or pop out of the gutter. I would agree one hundred percent with the procedure of staying out of line with the ring when filling the tire, for the first time, till the bead is fully seated against the flange. I would only use a locking type air chuck on the airline to keep my self out of the line of fire. And I would also agree that the results of a sudden release of air pressure from a pressure vessel can cause substantial damage. Afer all as was pointed out a tire pumped up to 40 or 50lbs contains a substantial amount of energy. Once the tire is fully inflated and the bead set, it is apparently as safe as any other rim, other wise we would have been reading about law suites and recalls for the last 60 years, from people being maimed by drive by ring pops.
So, MNSmith, if I understand you right, what your saying is that if you pick up a nail that the ring can be blown off also? Seems like that would create the same circumstances as pulling the valve core to deflate the tire, no? If that were the case, it would seem to open up another, avenue for law suites and recalls wouldn’t it?
Thanks Larry, if I remember correctly, it was Ru-Glide, I used to wet down all the rubber with it when I was a greaser at the Chevy garage in ’59. What we used on the tire beads was a soap, a tire mounting compound, because it would wash off and any thing that was left between the bead and rim would eventually wash out. I believe the Ru-Glide rubber lub soaked in to the rubber, soften it and maybe even expand it a little. There are lots of compounds on the market now but I can’t use five gallons of it.
I have never seen a “cage”, and am sure I couldn’t afford one, nor would I have room for one. Would like to see what you all are talking about though.
I have on of those cheap’o Harbor Freight tire changers bolted to the floor, it has a bead breaker with it but I’m not sure yet if it will work on this heavy of a tire. It’s pretty light and only has a 7.5”x 1/8” base to support the wheel center on. I think they are more suited to ATV tires etc., ya might be able to peal off a 14” 2ply but not much more.
As far as cleaning the gutter and ring, the rims have been sandblasted and primed and painted, so they are clean.
Trucker, I would really like to read some of those threads, can you recall a link to any of them? The search thing doesn't seen to work very well for me, I haven't been able to find any thing with it yet.
And guys, I would change out the rims, but in three weeks of pounding the wheel thing into the ground here, and all the archived threads that I have been able to find so far, there appears to be no real agreement on a proper replacement wheel for the early 15”, 8 bolt, ¾ ton wheels with a 4 7/8” center. Let me add, other than having someone take your old centers and mount new tubeless rims to them, and that smacks of big bucks, even if you could find someone to do that.
Denny Graham
Sandwich, IL

denny,on the first link i provided.Scroll down to "tire in safety cage" and click on it.It shows a small version of a cage.

Denny,
if you do a general search of all the forums, with the button at the top of the page, the system returns 178 hits, for the word "splitrim". It must be all one word. If you do a search for "splitrim danger", you will get 16 hits.

Your rims sound like the type that do not use a separate lockring. One part of the procedure not mentioned so far, was to air it up with a remote hose, with no valve insert, and after the assembly has seated at minimum pressure, let all the air out. This I believe is in the manual.

There are some alternate rims available. I bought some on Ebay from 80's trucks. Two are Dodge and one is a Ford rim. I usually search for "8 lug" on Ebay motors and I get about ten pages to review. What I then look for is a rim with a 6" width. They usually will have an acceptable setback.

There is also a white rim with spoke like formations that is aftermarket, and very ugly. I understand that they fit too.

By the way, my Ford rim has the letters "0923 87" and the Ford script on it. I have been told that this is not a Ford number so it is a mystery.

Fred

The area between full inflation and total deflation is where the POTENTIAL for the most trouble is. Whether you are inflating or deflating. Rings have blown of on a soft tire driving down the road. That is one of the reasons for always keeping proper inflation within the design specs of the tire manufacturer. So if you have a tire going soft, always deflate it completely before removing it from the wheel from the vehicle.

Do a Google or Yahoo search for "tire inflation cage." They are affordable.

Doing split rim tires ( especially big truck tires ) is a good workout. Great for getting a young man in shape. I prefer not to do them anymore. Still got all the tools though, just in case I want to remember the old days!!

Well MN, you couldn't be more right. That $35 the dealer charges looks more and more appealing every minuet. The four rims on the truck look great, no rust, at least not on the out side. They are the ones I will leave on the finished product. I bought four more for spares and I forced three of the tires off the rims but ran into a brick wall on the fourth. The first three had a notch in the ring to start the tire iron in, but the last one and the four on the truck do not have a notch. So how does one get the ring started off on the latter style??? One of the first three was to badly rusted to be usable, but it served as a good training device for my first one. Not that the second and third one went any easier, I worked three hours trying to break the bead on one of them.
Now I spent all of my Sunday day on these and that was just to save $17.50 each, who’s the dummy here?
If anything good came out of today’s experience, it was that I now know that there is no way I’m gonna attempt to mount $750 worth of new rubber back on to these monsters. I just tain’t got the equipment, the experience, nor youth enough to mount them.
Lesson learned, the hard way!
Denny Graham
Sandwich, IL

Put one tire iron in the gap in the ring. Force apart and put your second tire iron between the ring and the rim. Work off like the other rings.

I'm gonna go out on a limb here and insult my inteligence. When you guys mention "split rims", are you talking about duallys or are the split rims you're refering to for single tires?

Two piece rim, the outer flange is seperate from the main portion of the rim.

Give that a try MN but I'm having trouble with there not being enough room for the tounge of the tire iron since the little notch is not there. can't get the iron bring up the edge enough to get the second iron in. I'll fight with it for a while, maybe something skinner like a screw driver will fit in the groove till I get it started over the edge of the rim.
Tks,
Denny G
Never Mind, found the notch!!!

Hey Denny G.
Two piece rim is the correct term here like you said. Split Rims have a ring that is split and is more dangerous than a Two piece rim. I have the original two piece rims and they were a huge pain to get the old tires off. They had been on since th 70's and there was alot of rust. I bead blasted and painted them and hope they come of easier next time.

Sorry Ray, I think it’s just a matter of semantics really. The tire dealer and most of the guys here were referring to them as split rims. I figured it was a generic term for any rim that could be split apart, specifically, two piece split rim or three piece split rim. The Shop Manual does refer to them as two piece rims, I'll give ya that.
What ever ya choose to call them, I think we can all agree, they are one big old, pain in the arss!
Denny Graham
Sandwich, IL

I have done a lot of tires with split rings when I was a kid working in a gas station. We always used a clip on air chuck and put the ring down, under the lube rack hoist. Had one come loose but the hoist held it down and there was no damage. I always steer clear of them now, they are lethal if they come off under pressure.