How To Widen A Set Of Wheels 

Used to have a local guy, back in the 80’s, widen wheels for the racers in the area! I was one of them! This was before you could just get on your phone and order what you needed! Ah, what we used to put ourselves through to get to the track on Saturday night!

Very nicely done, and I completely appreciate steel rims. I have a nice collection of 1966 factory wide Mopar rims, 5.5 was wide back then, but they all have some sort of deficiencies, curb damage and opened up lug holes mainly, I guess this is why I’ve never been able to find a shop to consider fixing them. There used to be a local shop that would do whatever you wanted, but long gone, I’m in Canada as well.

Great idea! Now all I have to do is find an old brake lathe to use. I'm from BC. A place I worked for in the '70s used to widen wheels on a huge lathe. Used to turn 15" x 6" rims into 15" x 10". To weld the extra steel onto the rim, we used a multi arm cam driven spider that expanded into the inner diameter of the rim to which the widening strip could be clamped to. Weld up was also done on the lathe that was sloooow turning. Gott watch that back spacing too, depending on what the wheels are going on. Quite often the only difference of some thing being "legal" and "illegal" is if the welder was a certified welder or not. Cops are definitely NOT the ones to ask if something is "legal" or not on a vehicle. Most have no clue. "Because I can" is the correct answer, not "because I'm stupid" 🤣

Very Cool! Good idea using the brake lathe. I own a brake lathe and I had never considered using it this way.

Awesome job they look great. 👍

Great description! Thanks for making the video!

The wider wheels do indeed fill the fenders very nicely!

Great explanation, subscribed! Thanks😉👍

Nice craftsmanship.

I love this vedio. Hey i had this tired place do my 88 Acura legend. They make the car ride so smooth on the highway it almost put your too sleep. How they do that.?

I understand you are editing this but wished I could have seen the entire process. Awesome video, got a 70 Z28 with a 383 Stroker pushing 500+ HP and 400 + ft lbs torque at the rear wheels. I NEED TRACTION BAD. But want to keep the 5 spokes. Off to get 2 OER's now and add 3" for 10 " wide rims... Thanks for showing me the process. I'll be able to keep the offset, have that factory look and get some badly needed traction!!!!! Subscribed and liked!!

Great work!!!!

Not to try to spoil fun time in the shop but Bassett race wheels make really nice steel wheels. Also DOT approved ones. Fun video.

Great projects, reminds me of my shop teacher. Maybe in your next video ask for comments to name the shop teacher that made an impact on us

Mig those and save a couple days. And less tacks, use a cut wheel so as to facilitate an open root, approximately one sixteenth with the right disk between the tacks, 100 percent penetration. Pro tip for anyone attempting this.

Hmmmm, Sir used to say that this car was going to save money… wider tires use more fuel, Science Teacher told us… 😜 Solid work on the welding and fabrication though, and _very_ tidy finish! Sexy? No 🙂 but it does look good!

youre very valuable man

Is the one headed hammer a DIY? What's that like to swing? I can't decide if it would self align or if I think it would be wildly imbalanced.

Back in the day we had to do similar, however, wedidnt have tig or mig welders available and had to use stick welders

What Welder do you have??

You do it because you can! I like the steel wheel look too….

Hey can you do a diy e30 bottle caps wheel

You did it because you can. Nice use of a brake lathe. If you could slow down the brake lathe you could use a mig and speed things up.

El mejor canal de todo yputube :-)

Hey there. I'm a retired machinist, and left-handed. I spent many many years trying to find if anybody had ever made a left-handed lathe or an ambidextrous lathe. The economics has made it essentially never done and I've become strangely obsessed with building one. I was vaguely aware of brake lathes but assumed they were quite limited and I had no idea they had a headstock on the right. What you're working with looks like a very strong candidate as a platform for such a project. Could I ask the make and model? And if there is specific jargon for the headstock being on the right? Thank you in advance.

any predictions on the balancing after all is done?

Just subbed 👍👍👍👍👍🇨🇦

Just about the same as we did for the dirt track racers in the late 1960s

Plan C. Buy wide hoops and cut out the wheel centers and weld them into the new hoops with whatever offset you want.

Where did you find that bubble tool! That's an old school tool used before hi tech machines were made. I want it for my vett. !

How much to do mine ?

Hahaha, so Steelies are technically 3 piece wheels! Dope ❤ I love steelie styled wheels, they really look great and aggressive.

Wish you were in my area

Smart guy 👍👍👍👍

Sweeeeet. 👍👍😎👍👍

Would it be possible with aluminum wheel?

awesome job !!! ... never say you're stupid

You mention the use of epoxy and I never bought any, but can spray. What epoxy brand & p/n do you find in the great white north? I have one more, promise. Epoxy that is simple two part, mix, induction period sometimes (What I call, The chemical handshake) But I am not able to afford certain brands, but the “DTM” stuff that contains an acid, weak, strong, vinegar, don’t know” It bothers me because they are for it, or against it! I am scared, upset, confused (Because today is Father’s Day, & my wife of 40+ has me fixing the washing machine, YEA, Bingo, Cats Meow) I can’t make up my mind about epoxy! Can you help. Thanks!

Another possible option, if you could find other 7'' rims and cut out the centre stud plate and just reweld that in. I hope I explained that ok.

I can't say I've ever banded a wheel. I have seen it done. Just never had to do it myself. I have turned a lot of steel wheels into beadlocks. Lots of welding and lots and lots of bolts.

I’m just happy to see an American using a guard on their grinder for once 👍🏼😁ha!

In this wide brown land down under, you can widen the rim by 2inches (50 mm) maximum but you cannot increase the track width, so both wheels need to be widened similarly and you need to place the band in the rights spot!!! Not always easy for the DIY FOLK,!! Stavros

I am honestly curious why you chose to TIG on steel rims rather than just using a mig welder?

10:15 I have been done this with 8 rims. Najtrudniej było wyciąć rotor , bez uszkodzenia zewnętrznego rantu. Efekt był zadowalający.

I watched this because I have to attempt to repair 4 atv rims that the bead had completely rusted off. Why not just get used replacements you ask? Because this particular atv is apparently the only one ever made that used this rim size, offset, and lug pattern, in other words I have been searching for two years and have not found any rims to fit it. I am considering two options, cut off the bead of a good rim the same diameter and weld it on or cut the centers and weld a good outer rim to them. However more and more I’m thinking about parting out the atv, this thing has been nothing but a pain in the rear trying to find anything for it

This seems like the perfect thing for a "stock" drag car..🤣

is this osha safe?

Local hot rod shop used to do exactly this Steel wheel widening Back in early 70's. He did a decent job and they were affoordable. Sum Bitch to true and Balance though. Fairly high failure rate (unbalanceable and not true). Not nearly as Easy as it looks.

before you did yer 'don't do this' disclaimer I was going to suggest that you add a disclaimer " 'don't be stupid, take responsibility, if you kill yourself it's not my problem'" but I think you said it pretty well. enough said. Ideas for future projects/videos 1::add a drive motor to your ring roller, Take off the hand wheel and put a transmission flex plate and ring gear, driven by a variable speed motor (not a starter, necause you will want a soft start and ramp up speed and reversing. 2: rotary table to put insider your blast cabinet to spin wheels as you blast. 3: I forget. My last shop class was in 1968

Why do it .?? Because you can and it makes an interesting video . More so than going and buying a set . Would be a real short and boring video .in the UK this is called banding and it is actually street legal , a lot of custom VW Van's and bugs use them I'd guess reasons being you can widen a steel rim easier than an alloy. Thanks again

i got 16 x 10 steel wheels..

This type of wheel modification is illegal in many Countries and rightly so because of the critical nature of the wheel construction. There are too many wheel modifiers out there and almost without fail the welded band is not tested for integrity. There are aftermarket wheel suppliers that provide wider wheels in various diameters and offsets that are properly manufactured and at a cost that almost matches banding but with the guarantee of quality. If you wish to retain the centre of the wheel then it is possible to get the aftermarket steel wheel providers to supply just the rim or get a metal spinning company to create a new rim that has proven to be particularly economic. Banded wheels are illegal for use in all forms of motorsport AFAIK and certainly in Europe and bearing in mind that motorsport has access to the very best engineering that says how banded wheels are regarded. Unfortunately there are too many low skilled engineers attempting this.

I don't see the need for a grinder to cut ,when you have cutters on a brake lathe

I want to go to his school! Oh, darn it I'm fifty years old. :(

That seems a bit overkill on the rules. In the UK any wheel is allowed as long as it spins true and holds the tyre properly.

You don’t keep welding in a strait line that’s how you warp it 😂😂😂😂😂

i would rather use spacers or buy wider wheels. because i am afraid the machine shop just claim they know what they are doing but really, they didn't know. for me, you may send to someone that you know he knows how to do this. but if you are not sure, better not. it is for your own safety.

you did it because you can

The new metal looks too thin to me!

Why!? Because you can!

No good in Australia banded wheels are illegal.

Question: Why weld steel wheel's ... Answer: To make a sleeper....

I'd paid for mine to be widened.

legal for race.. ??..race is 100mph.. street is 55mph.....???...

Don't do it Wink wink

Where there is a WHEEL there is a way... And why should a RCMP know anything about CAR'S WHEELS ? Horse shoes may be more appropriate.... lol

Freakin legal hooks....😒Always seeing if they can get in yer pockets...

If not street legal, then where do you get them? That width? Band the rims and break the law!!!.

Why bother ? Just buy nicer wide wheels whether they be allot or steel it’s still more cost effective than all that faff, and that’s ok if you have the gear 🤷‍♂️

you should have made it wider on the outside of centre cos it will probably touch the steering rod or inner guard now lol

If anyone asks the question why would you widen steelies …. Because steel wheels 🛞 are much stronger and forgiving to road surface compared to mag wheels 🛞, Ciao