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DIY Beadlocks

rattlewagon

shitboxin
Joined
May 20, 2020
Member Number
552
Messages
454
Loc
Northfield Vermont
Had a thread on the other forum, but now that they are finished, heres what I did.

Started with pro comp steelies.

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A guy in our club with a fab shop cut the rings for me from 1/4. He also added an anti cone strip.

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He did the welding, so I guess these arnt really DIY :homer:

Valve stem hole closed up and moved up to the center of the rim so its not right behind the ring. I used short 1.25/.453 stems and a 7/16th drill bit for the new hole.

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I read on a different forum abut using roof tar for the beads instead of silicone as it stays flexible, and itsnt too bad if you need to break the tires down.

So used about a tube and a 1/2 doing both beads on each wheel.

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They also got two wraps of gorilla tape on the inner bead. Then torqued to 18 ft lbs. I used an 1/4 impact to get them all tight, then a torque wrench to finish them off.

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Theyve been on the truck for a couple months now and a hand full of runs on them, Running 5 psi in the front of my Toyota, 3psi in the rear. Havent had to add air to them at all.

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Cool to see a DIY beadlock build, been a little while. I need some motivation to do the same to a set of wheels I have sitting around waiting haha, just not looking forward to the time invested.
 
You can make them seal without adding sealant.

Before you do the final welds, grind a v into the beginning and end of the welds.

Start your weld 1" before the end of the last weld, then end 1" past the next.

Sand the welds flat. Then use soapy water and an air nozzle behind the bead to check for leaks. If you find one, use a drill or a grinding wheel to grind a v and weld it up.

First time I did this I didn't know to over lap and I had some pin holes that I sweat out with a tig. The last set I did, I may have had 1 spot on 1 wheel out of 4 that I had to go over.



The other thing I did on the last set was cut the lip off after I tacked the ring on. Those wheels mount like a store bought beadlock, where my last ones were a nightmare and actually damaged a few tires.
 
Nice tips on the welding. These welds were all air tight, I was just doing everything I could while I was already in there. And I still wanted the sealant on the inner side to help keep the bead on.
 
That's a good method.

The two sets I've made, I cut the ring to the full OD of the wheel and ground a bevel on the rear face to give me a nice V to weld up against the radius of the rim bead.
Makes for a beautifully sealed welded joint, but that extra millimeter or so of protruding weld bead makes for a motherfucker of a job fitting the tyres.
If my lathe was bigger I would have shaved them back a little. It'd be a lot of grinding to try and do by hand.
 
The other thing I did on the last set was cut the lip off after I tacked the ring on. Those wheels mount like a store bought beadlock, where my last ones were a nightmare and actually damaged a few tires.

I will definitely be doing this to my next set. I believe this is a great trick!
 
Nice tips on the welding. These welds were all air tight, I was just doing everything I could while I was already in there. And I still wanted the sealant on the inner side to help keep the bead on.
Air tight weld is much easier said than done. I'd pretty much guarantee if you weren't doing the method I mentioned, or tig, that they weren't :flipoff2:

My first set I did with a 350p pulse welder (read: hot right off the bat) they still leaked a smidgen until I found the leaks and sweat them with the tig.

Either way, throwing sealant on is what most people do.
 
The other thing I did on the last set was cut the lip off after I tacked the ring on. Those wheels mount like a store bought beadlock, where my last ones were a nightmare and actually damaged a few tires.
What part made that last set of wheels such a challenge for slipping tire beads over, was the beadlock plate bigger than the original wheel lip so it needed to stretch more?
 
What part made that last set of wheels such a challenge for slipping tire beads over, was the beadlock plate bigger than the original wheel lip so it needed to stretch more?
I don't know, I could never wrap my head around why it was any different than just mounting on a normal wheel. The rings dropped in just like the ones from the op.

I noticed when mounting tires on a non diy bead lock, that the OD was a little smaller and often you could just kinda aggressively drop the tire on with no spoons. The wheels I did for my Sami with the cheap speedway weld on kits are this way. :smokin:
 
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