Split Rings on Wheels - SAFETY REMINDER

These things are still out there on trucks and equipment, and obviously the younger generation may not be educated about the hazards involved, but need to be, so these things don't happen anymore.

I remember he had to also match stud pilot or hib pilot type rims and did some work on the lathe or something to make the lugs nuts/assembly work. Well established business, expensive, but always does top quality work, not sure what all the details were to make the switch on mine, sounded a little complicated for some reason, I thought it would have been much simpler.

Best thing to do is speak to a truck tire place and see what they can do with what you have, I'm not sure what my other options were here, but I was glad to have those 2 piece rims off the truck. Still have to figure out what's causing the left side to rub, when the wheel is turned to the max on in that direction, did not do that before.

I was talking with some coworkers today and learned of a pretty bad tire explosion around here. It happened about 10 years ago. It seems a farmer had gotten a flat tire on his tractor and put in a few cans of fix-a-flat. But he didn't have an air compressor handy... so he used the Oxygen tank from his torch set. The resulting explosion could be heard for several miles. I guess he lived, but had some pretty serious injuries.

Back home before the cages came out, the tire guys used to lay them flat on the ground, lock the air nozzle on, and back a vehicle over them before turning on the air pressure.

Having been around equipment like this for many years, a good part of my youth and later years in the construction industry, several of which were as an equipment operator and tractor trailer driver, I can clearly see how easy it is for something like this to happen, especially to someone new on the job or not educated or familiar with these components, knowing when to stop, call the shop, a mechanic and or someone trained to deal with these kind of wheels within the company. Definitely not a mechanic, but when things were slow in the winter, there was a skeleton crew not laid off (you had to be a good worker to be kept on, riff raff was always fired or laid off every year) for the winter that would be kept on for snow removal, mechanics helper, parts chaser etc., you learn about some things, this was one of them.

The design and configurations of these are what they are and as you said, are still prevalent on equipment, so are the pressures, 100-150 psi is something to respect no matter what you're dealing with

They (media) said it was a freak accident, and to a newspaper writer that may be the case or the general opinion of a reporter, but to anyone with even remote knowledge of these wheel configurations knows you could accurately predict what would happen when inflating the tire on one with the lock ring mis-aligned, not using a protection cage etc. you would know that it is a hazard and that the machine would have to be sidelined until a knowledgable person can arrive to the site with the correct tools and equipment to repair the wheel.

This accident should not have happened, all it would have taken was some general safety training relative to the companies fleet of equipment, a placard above the wheel well or something warning the operator on the tire or fender, somewhere ! It's like handing someone a grenade without the pin, who knows nothing about them, it's fine until you let go of it. It just sucks, a guy does 2 tours in a combat zone and comes home and has this happen.

When I drove a big truck, we carried tools and had to fix our own flats - all split rims - back 1960s- 1970s. The last Deere dealership I worked at - up to 1991 - the truck driver there was still required to fix his own flats on our old IH tilt-bed with split-rims.

One of my farm pickup trucks still has them - a 1969 Dodge W200 Power Wagon. I tried to get a flat fixed recenty - and not a single local tire shop would touch it. Confinement cages are reguired (as told to me) and they don't have them anymore.

So, back home, did it myself again with two saftety chains wrapped around the rim. Yeah, they're time-bombs and death-traps unless you work on them correctly. They also tend to blow up after they get rusty - when driving down the road and not being worked on. I've gotten so I hate even standing next to one.

You may have heard of the company Douglas Dyer & Sons, out of Mechanicville NY, they've been around here a long time, along with Royal Dyer, not sure of the relation if any they did a lot of utility work in the area. A lot of these outfits do snow removal to keep busy in the winter and that is where you will find a lot of older vintage equipment sitting all year until winter. I did a few tours on snow removal at local malls in NJ years back, late at night, cold snowing, tired from working the first shift, this is when safety gets forgotten.

I am in disbelief that this is still happening, and I can only hope the family he left behind has some some support and comfort at a time like this. Any company that has just one piece of equipment with these type of wheels needs to provide safety instructions or eliminate the hazard, he may not have had a clue, when I was his age I'd have probably done the same thing, no one ever educated me on those wheel types and at that hour you just want to get done with your work and go home.

They are not the same as the 2 piece cast hub and rim combos so coveted by outdoor fire pit builders.

So why are they so dangerous? It looks if they are free of corrosion and not overinflated to be as safe as a regular rim. What am I missing? Are some rings just friction fit or something?

I think "split rim" to anyone over 40 or 50 means one thing - the three-piece rim that just about all big trucks, and many smaller pickup trucks and off-road stuff used. Main rim, rim-lip, and lock-ring that holds that rim-lip in place. No bolts, just air-pressure and metal against metal (hopefully). Both my 1949 Ford pickups and also my 1969 Dodge Powerwagon still have them. So does my late 1960s Pettibone backhoe.

Thank-you, all the pictures I found where what they call split rims, not split ring rims.

I can easily see the problem with the split ring design, wouldn't last 10 years up here with all the salt. Kind of spooky stuff, what used to happen if you bottomed out a tire in a pothole? Looks like it could instantly dislodge a ring and lose a tire!

This is the rim type I saw and mistook:

LOL

Aaron