Thread: Ford Wire Wheel Tech

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Heres a little tech about 28-35 stock Ford wheels and some aftermarket ones
All these wheels had 5 on 5.5 bolt pattern and about the only other thing they had in common was that they all have a space for a flange inside the bolt pattern circle. This flange or two plane bolt patteren pad was only on mechanical brakes so when using 40-48 or any other brake setup a spacer should be used to give the 1928-35 wheel support on the inside of the bolt pattern, but many people dont and they ussually seem to be ok. But you should definately not use newer ford wheels on mechanical brakes.
Anyway, here a little about each stock wheel.

28-29

These are 21"x3" wheels with welded spokes. As you can see the top spokes are straight lace and the bottom spokes are single-cross. They have a rolled bead rim and are prone to cracking on the hub from one of the bottom spokes to the bottom or back of the hub.

30-31

30-31s are pretty much the same thing as 28-29s except for they are a 19"x3" wheel with a normal bead rim called knife edge. Same pattern for spokes, cracks in the same place and welded spokes.

32

These are 18"x3 1/4" wheels with welded spokes. The spokes are single cross on top and bottom. Hubcap hole size is 5 3/4, as is the rest of the wheels mentioned here forward. Unlike the two Model A wheels the lugnuts on these are covered by the hubcap.

33-34

These are 17"x3 1/4" rims that are pretty much the same as 32s.

35

Same as 32-34 wheels but they're 16"x4" These are by far the most plentiful because back in the war years, when a car needed new tires, a set of these wheels with new tires could be had for less than a set of 17" or 18" tires because of the price of rubber if you could find them. A good way to tell these apart from 17s and 18s without measuring is the valve stem hole. The 16" has a normal hole in the flat part of the rim, while 17" and 18" have the hole in a humped up area. (see pictures of the 17" and 18")


Aftermarket

18" Ajustable Motor Wheel


17" Bent Spoke Motor Wheel


16" Bent Spoke Kelsey


16" Ajustable Spoke Kelsey

Some of these wheels have rivited spokes that have to bend right before they go through the rim so they can be rivited striaght, this is how they get their nickname "bent spoke kelseys". Where the spokes go through the hub they are not welded or rivited, but loose. Most of the 16" wheels are made by Kelsey-Hayes while most of the 17" and 18" wheels like this you'll see are made by Motor Wheel. You can tell if it's made by Motor Wheel or Kelsey-Hayes by looking at the dimples on the lower spokes. If the dimples go in, toward the bolt pattern, then its a kelsey, if the dimples go out, toward the rim, then its a Motor Wheel. Also the Kelseys have 40 spokes and the 16" Motor Wheel had 36. The 17" and 18" Motor Wheel has 32. The 16 inch Kelsey bent spoke wheels came in 2 different widths 4 inch is the most common and a 4 1/2 wide that had a flat area around the valve stem hole. Kelsey and Motor Wheel also built ajustable spoke wheels. The spokes on an ajustable wheel are held together by little nuts called nipples. The nipples go through the rim and screw onto each spoke. Kelsey made ajustable spoke wheels in 17", 16" and 15", they also had 40 spokes. On the 17" and 16" the top spokes crossed twice and bottoms crossed once. On the 15" wheel the topspokes only crossed once and the bottoms didn't cross at all. Motor Wheel made an ajustable spokes wheels in 18", 17" and 16". The spokes on Motor Wheel ajustables were swedged, which means they are bigger where they come through the hub than where they connect to the nipple.
Kelsey and motor wheel also made adjustable spoke wheels in 16 X 4 with lock rings for easier mounting and dismounting. The rims where made by firestone Lock ring wheels are like trucks had in the 1930s thru about the 1970s

Hey everybody, heres a tech on some of the more common Ford steel Wheels that hot rodders use. Hope somebody finds this useful.

Wide Five Wheels


36-39 Ford

The '36-39 Ford had the "wide five" bolt pattern, the actual bolt pattern is 5 on 10 1/4 and it is also easily identified by just looking at it. All the normal cars and pickups had 16x4's, but the ones that had the V8-60 engine had 16x3.5's. The hubcaps on these wheels are held on by clips. The 36-38 Lincolns and '39 Mercurys also had 16x4 wheels. A separate company, not Ford; converted Fords to 4-wheel drive and they put wide five wheels on their cars from 36-47. They were 16x5 and they didn't have the spokes around the bolt pattern. These wheels are fairly rare. Wide 5 wheels also came in 18 x 3.62 for high clearance needs.

40-48 Ford and Mercury, 39-48 Lincoln


40-48 Ford


39-40 Lincoln


42-48 Lincoln

The 40-48 Ford, 40 Merc, and 39-40 Lincoln were 16x4 and the bolt pattern was 5 on 5.5. The Ford and Mercury wheel hubcaps were held on by knobs that were on the inner part of the wheel and connected around the outside of the hubcap, this is called an inside knob hubcap. The Lincoln wheel hubcaps were held on by clips. In 1940 the Fords that came with V8-60s had 16x3.5 wheels. In 1941 Merc and Lincoln both had 16x5 wheels, Merc still had inside knob hubcaps and Lincoln still had clips. The 42-48 Mercury and Lincoln wheels were 15x5 and again Mercs had inside knob hubcaps and Lincolns had clips. Also a 18 X 3.62 wheel with the 5x51/2 bolt pattern was made for cars and light pickups, sometimes called milk truck wheels or divco wheels. They had a spoke look like a wide 5 but with only 8 wider spokes. They also used the stock 40 thru 48 hub caps These wheels could be had on 40 thru 48 fords cars and light trucks in the U S and thru 64' on pickups in Canada.

49-56 Ford, 49-51 Lincoln and Mercury


49-51 Mercury


15" 49-56 Ford


16" 49-52 Ford

Normal 49-56 Ford wheels were 15x5 with a 5 on 4.5 bolt pattern. Their hubcaps were outside knob which means the knobs are on the inside of the hubcap and on the outside of the center of the wheel. The hubcap that these wheels took measured 10 1/8 accross the back. From 49-52 Ford offered a 16x4.5 as an option, same bolt pattern and hubcap. From 49-51 the 6-cylinder cars came with 15x4.5 and from 52-56 the station wagons had 15x5.5 wheels on them, both same bolt pattern and hubcap. The 49-51 Mercurys had 15x5.5 wheels with a 5 on 5.5 bolt pattern. The hubcaps were bigger than normal Ford hubcaps. I'm not exactly sure of what size the hubcaps are, but it's something like 11", but they are still outside knob caps. 49-51 Lincolns also had 5 on 5.5 bolt pattern, but were 15x6s. They also had wheel covers instead of hubcaps. They had little bumps on the rim to hold the wheel cover on.

Ford Pickups

49-64 Pickup


65 and up Pickup

Up until 1949 Ford pickups just used the same wheels as the cars, but when the ford cars moved to the 5 on 4.5 bolt pattern the pickups didn't. They stayed with 5 on 5.5. The wheels they used from 49-64 much like 40-48 in that they had inside knob hubcaps and 5 on 5.5 bolt. The early wheels were 15x5 and the later ones were 15x5.5, I'm not sure what year they switched over to the 5.5 width. In 1965 Ford trucks switched over to an outside knob wheel and kept that wheel up to the mid 80s

Hope this is useful
Thanks, Jimmy

That should be helpful to a lot of folk Jimmy. Good job.

One small correction, the '41-48 Fords were 16x4.5", only the 1940 model year was 16x4".

Thanks bob, on the 40-48 fords there was a lot of debate on the widths, all the parts interchange books I have say they were all 4", but when I talk to people some say 41-48 was 4.5, some say it was 42-48 and others say 46-48. So I just decided to write what the books say. But I have some 16x4.5 ford wheels so they must have made them some time

Great post!!! Wish I would have had all that info years ago instead of wishing and hoping I had the correct wheels for customers cars!!!! Thanks for taking the time to work it up for us.

When using the early Ford wheels on modern brakes is there anyone out there making spacer to adapt the multi-level flange to give the wheels a more secure fit?...

Dave Brisco

I believe these folks do, if not they should be able to steer ya;
MT Car Products
1344 Manhattan Dr.
Paradise, Ca 95969
(530) 872-0122

yep, we have those too

Thanks for the reply guys... Wheelkid what do you guys charge for a set of these? Are they made from aluminum? Got any photos?

Thanks,

Dave Brisco

This is something I am interested in too. I have a few sets of '35 Ford 16inch wilre wheels that I want to use at least on '40 Ford brakes, and maybe on a later Ford or Chevy rear axle. My understanding is that the ford wire wheel doesn't snug up real securely against the '40 drums unless you use a spacer made for that purpose. What can you tell me about that?

Also, how can you adapt these to a later Ford or Chevy bolt pattern? I've never been a fan of wheel adapters, as the ones I used years ago kept coming loose.

Any light you can shed on this subject will be helpful, and I bet others would like to know, as these wheels are getting popular again.

Don

Just picked up a set of 35 Ford wires for the rear and am looking for a set of 32 wires for the front. I am still interested in any info on those flange spacers and would probably purchase a set as soon as I can get some info...

Wheelkid you out there?...

Dave Brisco

Me too.


I saw him posting on another forum, maybe he's moved.


Don

Maybe he will check it soon and see our posts... If not might have to track him down over on the HAMB...

Dave Brisco

Sorry for not answering earlier guys, I guess I didn't notice the new posts here. Anyway here's your answers

We charge $80 a set for the spacers, They're made from steel, sorry I dont have any pictures of them, I'll try to get some for you.

As for adapting those wheels to a different bolt pattern, we would cut out the old bolt pattern and weld in a different one. No adaptors required.

Jimmy McLean

Thanks for the reply, it is easy to miss a post so not big deal, I would have tracked you down...

Il need a set of those adapters, I will shoot you an e-mail and we can work out the details...

Thanks,

Dave Brisco