The Wedge Works Great

One my duece tire upgrade going from 9.00 to 11.00, I have 5 done. I have 6 rears left. The truck is leaning pretty hard with the taller tires. I have a bearing hub oil seal that is bad and I need to change it out today before I button up the driver side. Brandon came by Saturday on the way to Mil truck paradise and loaned me the long handled duck bill sledge. I had one tire broken down in under 5 minutes. Others are stuck and need a lot of whacking to coax the bead off.
What a difference the right tool makes. THANKS Brandon!!

BTW, Carquest quoted me 339.00 for the same tool.:eek: He must have been looking at the wrong part.

I have a picture of the 11.00 on the rear fronts and 9.00 on the rear axle. Quite a difference.

Brandon wanted me to post this. Should be a little faster on the hiway.


http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v2...ndduece002.jpg

Looking good. It will look nice when all those tires are on there.

I think I've sweated off 5 pounds so far. Tomorrow is supposed to be 103.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by kwai

The slot is in the lip of the lock ring. You can't see the first slot until you break the bead loose and pry the ring away from the wheel. There are, I think, 3 slots around the ring.

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I see, haven't gotten that far yet.....

I didn't mean for this to turn into a tire tech article, but it fits good here.

Look at an assembled rim. Find the crack in the lock ring. Put it at the 12 o'clock position. The part of the ring going to 1 o'clock is the part you remove first. We will call that the right side. If you stick a pry bar on the right side of the ring at the split and put it under the left side of the ring. You can now push the ring down if the bead is busted. As soon as it goes down, it will also go out a little. You should now be able to see the cut out for the tire tools. Here is a picture of a M715 lock ring. You can see the cut outs at about 12:30 and 3:30 on the ring. If you put a tire tool in there, it allows you to use the curve in the tire tool as a fulcrum and pry the ring up. Then you can use the second notch and repeat. That will normally get you real close to having it out if it isn't already.
http://img341.imageshack.us/img341/8...ockringqv0.jpg

Good info there Barrman. I will be needing to do all this sonner than later unfortunately. No one around here will touch my split rims so it's up to me. I have found a duck billed hammer at an auto parts store but it has the fiberglass handle. Should I pass on it and get the wood one?

The one I have (that I lent to Al) is a fiberglass handle. I haven't broken it yet, and don't see why anyone should be breaking the handle. I've done numerous splits with it so far. I have fiberglass handled sledges and axes as well, I don't mind them. I guess it is personal preference, and how inclined you are to missing. :D

Most are broken from hitting the wedge face with a sledge hammer.

When you read ken-tool's website investor reports they note that sales of tire tools (like duck-billed hammers, tire spoons, etc) is declining but sales of wooden handles for the hammers remains strong. Hmmmm, I wonder why.....