Wheel diameter question
 

Bergen, Norway 9th April 1940. Norwegian 9th Infantry Regt mobilizing.

This lorry is possibly a Fargo. Anyhow I am interested in the wheels.

Could the diameter be 860 mm?

Which is the English expression for the holes in the wheeldisc?

Wheel / Tyre
 

The wheel is the standard commercial type built by Budd for Ford, Chevrolet and Chrysler and others, too. It is also of the type used on Mk 1 carriage for Bofors guns (but you knew that already, didn't you Stellan?). It is a 20 inch rim and was available in a variety of rim widths and offsets. The tyre looks to be a 6.00-20, earlier known as a 32x6, which according to Coker tyres , should be about 32.4 inches diameter, or 822mm.
Regarding the wheel, the holes are not usually given a name (unless there is a particularly descriptive shape), this is a five spoke wheel.

The truck is a 1938 Fargo. Very nice pic I have not seen many of these Fargo pics around, just wish I had a few more pics of them when I owned them 25 years ago.

Cheers
Cliff:salute:

Stellan:

Your vehicle is a 1937/38 Fargo (probably 1938 as I have seen others) which is a "badge engineered" Dodge as sold by Chrysler export in Europe and South America amongst other places.
Most likely a 1.5 ton model. Nice pic, love those rare ones.
Bill

Fargoes were Dodge trucks sold by Plymouth dealers across Canada and exported all over. I would guess the tires to be 6.50x20's. The holes (one of them, at least) are for valve stem access.

Swedish?
 

The truck could have been assembled in the Chrysler Stockholm Plant.

Single wheels suggest its a one ton. On closer study, I think the tires are 7.50x20's.

Wheels
 

Thank you dear friends! This has helped me a lot!

Thanks to Bill I got Gander´s "Bofors book" - which has several errors but also with a lot of correct info.

No, Tony, I did not know of these Budd standard wheels on Bofors guns - but I suspected it. That was the cause why I wrote the question.

This picture is interesting. To the left we see the five spoke (front)wheels we have been discussing. To the right a later type. The brakes were on the back wheels (right on photo).

The gun is the original m/34 owned by Bofors and used for trials and demonstrations. From the beginning this carriage had four five-spoke wheels.

My guess it that they put up new back wheels because 1) the brakes had been damaged or 2) brakes had been improved.

So please comments on the "new" wheels.

It isn't a one ton....
 

...at least I don't think so. The 39-47 Dodge / Fargo one tons were the only trucks in the series that had six lug wheels, lighter and heavier trucks all had five lug. Of course this truck is pre-39 so it might not hold for that.

Numerically the most common products they made were the half and ton-and-a-half trucks which acounted for 58% percent of production, so one tons and two tons units were relatively scarce.

The single wheels and short wheelbase point to a one ton size, as for the 5-bolt wheels, I've seen Dodge one-tons with 20-inch 5-bolt wheels. Of course, this truck is in "Yurrup" which means different options and rules apply.

Stellan- the 8-hole wheels on the braking axle are offset more than the 5-holers on the other end. The brakes were sourced from a vehicle intended to have dual wheels, as evidenced by the raised center giving clearance between the tires. Using the wheels that go with the hubs ensured that the front and rear wheels tracked right.

Well....
 

I wouldn't completely exclude the possibility of it being a one ton, but it seems to be a question of the axle type more than anything else.

The 1.5 tons and upwards used full floating spiral bevel or full floating hypoid types, and the 0.5 tons used semi-floating hypoid - both were numerically common as I mentioned before.

The one ton trucks, certainly 1939-47 one tons, used a semi-floating spiral bevel axle that was only used on the one tons and nothing else, and only came with six lug wheels which were disc wheels for 1939 and 1940;

http://www.gwim2.pwp.blueyonder.co.uk/DODGE.jpg

and conventional drop centres from 1941-47;

http://www.gwim2.pwp.blueyonder.co.uk/duals.jpg

The maximum gross for the one ton was 6000lbs, but the maximum gross for the lightest of several varieties of 1.5 tons was only 6700lbs (heaviest was a whopping 13,500lbs)

If the build logic was the same in 1938 as it was in 39 (open to question) the truck in the picture would likely be one of the lighter 1.5 tons - numerically much more common and more widely distributed. Note that European trucks 'built' in places like Kew were more realistically just assembled there from parts shipped over from Detroit or Windsor. Coachwork and cargo bodies were locally-sourced of course.

Oh, and the one ton trucks could and did come with dual rear wheels too - the ability to fit rear duals was presumably one of the reasons they went to drop-centre type wheels for the 1941 one ton while keeping the oddball six lug rims. The dual rear rims had bevels to lock the rear duals together in use and are amongst the rarest and most hard to obtain (read "expensive")

I had to research this for the 39 one ton I have here and the 1941 one ton I'm building next....

Budd wheels
 

The Budd 5 spoke wheels were also designed to run as dual rear applications. They came in a multitude of rim widths for various tyre sizes, various offsets for differing sizes and numerous bolt patterns. They were fitted to most North American trucks from a 1928 Ford AA (one of the earliest applications) shown below, up to Australian built Internationals of the late 60's, and just about everything in between from trucks to heavy caravans and trailers.

1941 generator trailer
 

Budd wheels, but not Ford / Chev bolt pattern:

Re: Wheels
 

Stellan, attached goes a picture of a Canadian 20-cwt GS Trailer chassis, which was uprated from 15-cwt by (besides some other details) fitting 20 x 6 Standard Commercial Disk five spoke five stud wheels with 4.5" offset, fitted with 7.00x20 pneumatic type tires. Their part no. is F/81T-1015, denoting they were supplied through (but not necessarily manufactured by) Ford Canada.
Why I am posting it here is because the 20-cwt trailer had drum brakes, so I see no reason why the five-spoke wheels had to be changed for the eight-spoke wheels on the m/34 Bofors gun. Could it have something to do with offset?

Hanno

Wheels
 

Here is the same individual gun m/34. I think there was only one such gun. Here with four five-spoke wheels.

This is the only gun I have seen with five-spoke wheels. All other Mk I (eqv) guns have four eight spoke wheels?

Who knows more of the eight-spoke type?

Gordon--never saw a 3/4 ton or larger with semi-floating rear axles, at least not until the '80's. Lots of one-tons up here in Canada had 20-inch 5-bolt wheels, IHC, Dodge and Fargo. Your six-bolt dual rims are the same as IHC wheels, some had the "Inny and Outie" holes, some just relied on the bolts for alignment. I've got stacks of 'em.

Gordon--I blew up the lead photo, and lo and behold, that thing's got semi-floating axles! The hub end is flush with the wheel flange. Which got me to remembering a neighbor's 38 Dodge one-ton that broke an axle and the wheel came off. We were all disgusted that a one-ton wouldn't have full-floaters. So I guess Dodge did build some, at least. And by the way, that one-ton had 7.00x20's.

Stuff
 

You could get a variety of rims for the one tons (39-47 anyway) but they were all six bolt.

I'm not a big believer in the semi-floaters anyway, and I'm amazed that the army did use them - right up to the time the first wheel and hub fell off anyway.

The 1939 civilian one ton semi-floating axle and wheel formed the basis of the 1940 military VC half ton rear axle, right down to the novel idea of the whole wheel parting company with the truck if the axle shaft broke. Even the 1940 military VC wheel is the same rim as the 1939 one tin rim, but drilled for five lugs not six, and with the rib at the centre turned in, not out.

As to having lots of stuf lying around - if you happened to have a military VC front axle there somewhere let me know - I need one for a project.

If the truck up top has a semi-floating (anything) back axle it might be a one ton, as they weren't daft enough to use semis on anything heavier than that.

Gordon

Gordon--your six bolt flat face wheels are 3/4 ton stuff.

Erm - no?
 

The 3/4 ton WD trucks were marginally uprated versions of the half tons, with stronger shocks, springs, etc, but like everything else that's not 1 ton they use five bolt wheels.

The six bolt disc wheels are 1939 and 1940 TD and VD 20 and 21 only, 120" pickup plus 133" pickup and panel.

Trust me - I'm Scottish, and I do actually own a 1939 one ton TD 20 pickup with those wheels on it and a 1941 panel with the drop centre six bolt type too.....

My 1939 TD 20 one ton

Terry down in England has a 1941 3/4 ton WD 15 and it has five bolt wheels on it, though confusingly the WD15s were the only trucks in the series that had 15" wheels as standard (all the others were 16")

Getting close to my specialist subject here..... 8~)

I can certainly claim no expertise on this particular one, but I did do some research on Chev and Ford 1/2, 3/4, 1 and 1.5 ton trucks through various period brochures I have. For the most part the 1 tonners look like uprated 1/2 or 3/4 tonners with a longer wheelbase and the same wheel tyre equipment you all have been talking about here. Point being, they looked for the most part like the light truck part of the line rather than being down rated medium trucks.
Having said that, I just ran across a pic of a Canadian Railway Express Fargo described as a 1 tonner which is obviously a downrated medium truck as far as I can tell. Yet another mystery perhaps or a bad ID.
Looking closer at Stellan's pic, I now would judge the vehicle to have some sort of pickup body rather than a GS sort of cargo body I missed that the first time, I do that often nowadays, as I have a number of pics of other Norwegian Fargo trucks as well as Finnish and Spanish ones and they all were obviously 1.5 tonners with GS bodies.
Thus, if it is a pickup and does have single wheel/tyre equipment I now believe it to be a one tonner and that would be consistent with the catalogue information I have on Chev, Ford and Oldsmobile vehicles of the same period.
I will try to post pics of the various 1.5 tonners later when I have more time.
Bill

talking of funny wheels I took this picture of a dual tyre setup on one of the 'D' series Dodges at Kingaroy, Queensland before they were scrapped. Can anyone tell me more about this one?

Cheers
Cliff:salute:

Tyre size was 7:00 or 7:50 X 20inch

Cliff , the truck may have had 10.50x18 rims to start with and this maybe a modification using 3 ton blitz rims ( 20 inch ) as tyres are easier to come by