safety hubs

[warwick_preval]

Hello fellow Ter's Asking for an 80 + friend in the middle of a busy intersection lost his back wire wheel & a good tow driver helped him out. He was just able to pull the studs back out with pointy nose pliers & got him on his way with a she's right mate. The question is HOW are the studs held into the safety hub cheers Warwick.

[babychadwick]

Slipped into the hub from the back side, not pressed. Enough friction allows the nut to be tightened holding it all in place. If the lug nuts and threads are not in good condition the stud will simply spin.

[Henry K. Lee]

Chad sometimes they need to be tack welded or pinned. depends on who made them.

Just Sayin,

Hank

[babychadwick]

Totally agree on the tack welding or pin. I was just answering the question as to "how" it might have been done. While on the topic that 12 rivet I picked up a while back, what was your thought process on drilling the 6 smaller holes on the drums?

[warwick_preval]

Thanks for the info I'll bet Henry wouldn't have made them that way. I will pass on the info to Tom about a dob of weld cheers Warwick.

[Original Smith]

Just think! If the car hadn't been modified, this problem wouldn't have happened.

[Jerry VanOoteghem]

Lots of questions here. How was it that the wheel fell off in the first place? Appears as if his lug nuts were loose and fell off, allowing the wheel to depart??? Also, how is it that they were able to reattach the wheel? Was nothing broken or missing?

[Dan McEachern]

It's a really bad idea to use the 5 Ford wire wheel studs to attach a safety hub to the wheel hub/brake drum assembly. Same goes for using the 6 wheel bolts on a wood wheel to mount the safety hub flange. A safety hub flange needs to be bolted to the wheel hub with its own set of grade 8 bolts. This requires drilling and tapping threads into the hub flange between the wheel bolts or wire wheel studs. The goal is to transfer the car weight from the safety hub flange to the wheel hub without relying on the wheel bolts.

[babychadwick]

Dan that makes sense to a point. The goal of safety hubs is to prevent a lost wheel should the axle break. If on the other hand the hub were to break you would still lose the wheel. Thru bolting on a wood wheel I would think would eliminate this possibility. I only bring it up as a friend had his hub break and the wheel left the car. After talking to him it turns out hubs breaking aren't that uncommon.

[Dan McEachern]

The flange breaking off of hubs is 99% of the time due to the outer plate not being a tight fit on the hub and the bolts not being tight. These two conditions allows the hub flange to flex while cornering, fatigue and ultimately fail. (Repeated Left and right turns create a fully reversed bending moment at the base of the hub flange.) My previous point was that you do NOT want the safety hub flange attaching bolts to be thru bolted on a wood wheel. As stated, the purpose of safety hubs is to guard guard against axle failure and subsequent wheel loss. They are not a universal solution to all potential wheel problems.

[babychadwick]

And the reasoning for not thru bolting to prevent wheel loss due to a broken hub is?

[Jerry VanOoteghem]

And the reasoning for not thru bolting to prevent wheel loss due to a broken hub is?

I believe the what Dan meant, was that you should not depend on the through bolts ONLY, but to ALSO use additional fasteners, threaded into the hub flange.

[Allan]

There can be confusion relating to "safety hubs". Not all hubs are made to be safety hubs. Some are designed to be "floating hubs" where the load is taken off the rear axle and transferred to the axle housing, like it is on the A models. These may not be "safety hubs" in the sense that the wheel is held captive on the rear axle housing should the axle break. The two different designs come with their own idiosyncrasies. What applies to one may not apply to the other.

Allan from down under.

[Jerry VanOoteghem]

There can be confusion relating to "safety hubs". Not all hubs are made to be safety hubs. Some are designed to be "floating hubs" where the load is taken off the rear axle and transferred to the axle housing, like it is on the A models. These may not be "safety hubs" in the sense that the wheel is held captive on the rear axle housing should the axle break. The two different designs come with their own idiosyncrasies. What applies to one may not apply to the other.

Allan from down under.

Allan,

Of the 2 styles you describe, I consider one to be a "safety hub" and the other to be a "safer hub".

In my case, I use the floating hubs, (i.e. "safer hub").

[Dan McEachern]

Thanks Jerry for the added commentary. Here are a few pictures- I was on another machine yesterday and had no pictures.
Regarding wood wheel installations- the 6 wood wheel bolts cannot ( in my experience) be torqued tight enough to provide a sufficient and reliable clamp force between the safety hub flange and the inside of the brake drum. This clamp force must now carry the weight of the car in addition to holding the spokes to the wheel hub. The wood is not stiff enough even if the wheel bolts could be torqued tight enough.

[Scott_Conger]

Dan

it is always so nice to see your beautiful products...and very good of you to weigh in on these sorts of topics to offer guidance and experience in these matters. When I see your signature, I know I can take the information to the bank.