Thread: Truck Wheels by Bret

Hello Mates,

I spent a good amount of time experimenting with how to make the wheels for my Scania truck and I know everyone likes to see how wheels are made so I thought I would do a how to. I made these with my drill press.

These are as close to scale as I could get with the hole saws I have. The 1:1 wheels are 40" in diameter and 11" wide. The rim is 22.5" So this works out to a 4" overall diameter tire with a 2.25" rim and 1.25" wide in scale 1/10.

First off I layed out two wheels 2.25" in diam. I located them right on the edge so the hole saw will have a relief for the sawdust.
Attachment 174275


I drilled a 1/4" hole all the way through the centerline. Then I drilled the back side 3/16" deep with a 1 3/4" hole saw. This establishes the hub.
Attachment 174276


Now I drilled the back side of wheel 3/8" of deep with 2 1/2" hole saw this establishes the o.d of the wheel.
Attachment 174277


Next I flipped it over and drilled 7/8" deep with a 2" hole saw to establish the i.d. of the front side of the wheel.
Attachment 174278


Now drill the front side with the 2 1/2" hole saw 3/8" deep. Then I used a 2" forstner bit to clean out the waste of the i.d. of wheel. In the picture I forget to drill the 2 1/2" hole on the left before I used the forstner bit to clean out. This makes it hard to locate the 2 1/2"hole saw as the bit is not long enough to reach the hole in the bottom. Oops! So I had to just drill this wheel all the way through from the other side.
Attachment 174280Attachment 174281

Next I drilled the 2 1/2" hole saw all the way through. In the second pic you can see there is no hub defined on the i.d. of front side of rim. I forget to photograph this but I used the 2" hole saw and 1 3/4" hole saw and drilled 3/16" deep on the inside of the front of the wheel to define the hub. You can see the hub in the very last picture.
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Next I attached my arbor I made for my drill press to sand and shape wheels. It is just a piece of 1/4" all thread. I have a board with a 1/4" hole at the base of my arbor to keep it steady while I work on it.
Attachment 174284Attachment 174285

After shaping the o.d. and sanding I took the wheels over to the bandsaw where I have the fence set to saw off 3/8" on the back side of the wheel. I only cut deep enough until I reach the the hole saw cut from step 2 which is 3/16".
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Next I chucked it back in the drill press and round off the backside of the hub. I use files, and a very small hand plane.
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Last thing to do is drill the lug nut holes and the outside holes. I have a jig I made to do this that has centerlines length and width and then 45 degrees drawn between these marks to make 8 marks total evenly spaced. The center has a 1/4" dowel for the wheel to spin on. I push the wheel on and them make tick marks on the wheel on each centerline so that when I rotate it wheel line up with one of the 8 marks. The lugnut holes are 1/8" and the outside holes are 3/16".
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Here is the finished result minus some sanding and filing here and there.
Attachment 174293Attachment 174294

Hopefully everything is clear and makes sense. If not please ask and I will be happy to explain. I will update this when I get the tires made.

Whew!!!
Bret