banks twinram

i have been doing some measurements and brainstorming about this for quite a while. it looks to me like i would need about 4" of spacing on the rear of my truck to be able to fit dually rims on the back. i do not want to buy a whole dually rear end and swap it out because there is nothing wrong with mine and they are very hard to come by and that would cost money... i have a good buddy that works at a machine shop that can build spacers for me for free. or i have been thinking about the factory spacers for the front hubs that bolt to the brake disk and then you bolt the tire to that. do you think i could fit one of these on the rear of the truck maybe with some machining to the middle of the spacer to fit over the rear hub? or would that make the spacer too weak to be any good? how could i make a spacer that would be strong enough to hold up to a gooseneck without problems? i can buy 2" spacers all day long from ebay but i dont think that would be quite enough room if i bought 2 sets and bolted spacer to spacer then to tire that would be 4" and be enough room, but they are 179 for a pair and that is a lot of money not knowing for sure if it would work or not. is there a web site that sells pre made spacers with good pictures that i can see what they look like before i buy them?

BearKiller

There is a local machinist that has made dozens of 4-inch DRW spacers/adapters for numerous trucks around my neck of the woods; so many, in fact, that one must examine closely when buying a used truck to tell if he is actually getting a DRW-ton, or one of this guys "conversions".


He machines a 4"-wide THICK spacer with SIXTEEN HOLES; eight are machined to fit over the factory studs and accept conical nuts, bolting the spacer on as if it were a wheel.

The other eight holes accept the DRW studs that the DRW wheels bolt to.

He machines these to be BOTH hub-centric and lug-centric, plus he machines them to fit snugly against the hub adjacent to the axle-flange, such that this also acts as a brace.

On the DRW side, he machines a hub-centric shoulder to locate the wheels.


Over the years, we have done the tire work on many of these and I have never known of a loose wheel or loose adapter situation, and all of these trucks work hard and tow heavy.


I have no idea what he charges for this work, but I know enough to know that he don't work cheap; I figure a decent second-hand DRW rear would cost less.

jcmoyer2004

or you could give arrow craft conversion a call, i heard that they can send you a complete kit for a dually conversion with 6 wheels, the spacers and the two fenders or you can just order the spacers. MBoliver converted his 3/4 ton over to a dually and says you can't even tell the difference. he is the one that turned me onto them, i'm going to be purchasing my conversion package pretty quick. just another idea to look into

powerrammaster

I have the Arrowcraft kit and I am not crazy about it. Then again I am a perfectionist. A couple things you would notice would be:

The rear hub will not protrude into the rim, it sits flush with the face of the rim where it is bolted up. Not a big deal, but it looks funny.

The other is that the Arrowcraft fenderettes are probably a bit beefier than the mopar and fit nice, but the wheel well opening on a single wheel is much smaller than a dually. The fenderette bolts up to the bedside and when looking inside the wheelwell you still have the old fender opening arch in there. While it can be painted black to hide it some it is still noticeable. if you are running large tires it may need to be trimmed, though unlikely. you can't really cut the opening upwards to the fenderette as there will be a gap between the inside and outside skins as the inner skin would have to be cut out also. That will leave a big gap where road grime can enter and be difficult to remove. It will also splatter all the way up inside the bed between the outer skin and inner tub.

The plus side is if you decided to someday go back to a single wheel effect you could easily remove all the stuff and only have to fill the holes in the bedside where the fenderette bolts were.

On the front, the hub protrudes from the rim but not as far as a true dually's would. The locking mechanism is still accessible.

To edit: the biggest part I forgot! When converting, the wheels on the rear will sit way inboard of the fenderette edges( by a couple inches just like using a cab and chassis rear axle) and it looks kinda dumb. Pickup dually axles put the outside edge of the tires even with the fenderette edges.

BearKiller

Another kind of DRW conversion that used to be very popular (and it could even be done to Datsuns, Chevy LUVs, Corvettes, and such) consisted of long hollow inside-threaded tubes that threaded over the excess threads of the factory studs (replaced with longer studs if the factory ones were a little stingy with the length).

The original SRW wheel stayed right where it was at; the hollow tubes were then threaded/tightened onto the factory studs; a spacer thingie with holes to match the bolt-pattern slipped over the hollow tubes; threaded studs were screwed into the exposed ends of the hollow tubes; a second factory wheel was mounted onto these studs.

These used to be fairly common and a lot of magazines advertised them.

There are four or five old DRW Datsuns, Toyotas, and the like, still running around here with this type DRW kit; one even has factory-looking "dually" fenders.

tractorfix

They still sell those on JC Whitney

92roughstock

You can get a god used DRW Dana70 axle for $500-600. I'm not sure if Ford used the adaptors on the front like 2ndGen Dodges, or if they used a different hub like 1stGen Dodges, but I'd think it's be just as cost effective to swap axles. Plus, I dont like the idea of any more bolts/ studs/ spacers holding my wheels on than I absolutely have to have.

powerrammaster

I agree with Roughstock, plus you are leveraging weight further out on the axle. More load is put on the spacer to transfer to the original wheel mounting surface.

banks twinram

hmmmm... a lot of good points. so with spacers they still dont stick out as far as factory dually wheels. and the hub doesnt stick out as far as the regular dually, but seems to me like you would be able to hide this with wheel simulators. i have a cab and chassis dually rear from a 95 does anyone know the exact difference in length from single to c.c. and dual rear ends??? is it more than 8 inches? maybe if i put the c.c. rear end with adapters it would look a little closer to factory dual. and i would have bigger wheel bearings too

banks twinram

it would just be hard to find a rear end close enough to ship to me or pick up easily without costing a fortune in shipping 600 for axle, 600 for shipping!!! ouch

banks twinram

i know where a factory 89 dually 5 speed with 60,000 miles is for 2500 would an 89 have a getrag overdrive or just direct high? old man said it gets 22mpg loaded down he bought it new

BearKiller

DANA 60, 70 and probably 80, SRW and DRW have the exact same size wheel bearings.

The center of the 8-on-6-1/2 wheel only allows a certain diameter of bearing.

The only way to get bigger wheel-bearings is to step up to a larger bolt-circle wheel.

99% of 3/4 and ton wheel-bearings are JLM104949, regardless of whether they be Dodge, Ford, or Chevy, because that is as big as the limitations of the wheel will allow; think about it.

banks twinram

i thought it was bigger bearings, guess not

PapeCAT

yah getrag would have 5th gear overdrive in that old man's truck. I think there is someone else on here asking about that same truck. Is it on Craigslist. 2500 for a truck with low miles like that is a real steal.

dodgenstein

DRW 70's have bigger inner wheel bearings than SRW 70's. I have a 93 3/4 ton 4x4, a 91 3/4 2WD, and a 93 dually 4x4, and have had the hubs apart on all of them. The dually has 35 spline axles and big inner wheel bearings.