1943 Dodge WC51 Weapon Carrier - Installing "New" NDT Tires

I've been putting off this task for as long as I've owned this truck, which is just about two years now. The guy I bought the truck from mentioned that he had four Non-Directional Tread (NDT) tires off in the woods on his property. He asked if I wanted them and I said sure, so I nabbed them. They are somewhat dry-rotted but are in better overall condition than what's currently on the truck. For two years they've just been sitting in the back of the ol' truck waiting for me to get some motivation to do the dastardly (and very difficult) deed.

The county Fair is coming up in a few weeks so I thought I should get myself in gear and start the process. This photo below is the first step, loosening the ten locking ring nuts. They take a 1-1/16" socket, and very tight. I had to use a cheater pipe on the end of the 3/4" ratchet.

Once the ten nuts were loose, I took off the five lug nuts with a 1-1/2" socket (left hand thread on the left side of the truck, don't forget), and popped off the 120 pound tire and wheel assembly. It actually felt heavier than that but I threw it on the scale in the garage just for my entertainment. Yep, only 120 pounds. Getting old is one of those inevitabilities of life.

The photo below shows the "old" tires coming off the truck (left) and the "new" NDT tires going on. It should be a lot easier to steer the truck with the skinnier tires. The overall height is maybe an inch shorter on the NDT tires. I guess my 45mph top speed will somewhat diminished.

The "new" tires are your basic military 9.00-16's. The tires coming off the truck are 36x12.50R16 tubeless radials (with tubes due to the wheel construction).

I bought this whiz-bang "bead breaker" gizmo on Amazon a couple of weeks ago, just thinking it might come in handy for the work I do with tractor tires. Well, it was also up to the task of breaking the bead on this "combat wheel", as these things are affectionately known as. I positioned the bead breaker in one spot, cranked down on it as far as it would go, then moved it to a new spot several inches from the old spot. After setting the bead breaker at three different spots, I was able to pry the bead off the rim. I flipped the tire over to then do the same to the back side.

The great thing about these two-piece wheels is that they don't have the typical (and very dangerous) "split rim" locking rings (I had a 1971 GMC pickup with split rims and I never did like messing with them). The locking rings on these combat wheels are held in place with ten studs and nuts, so there is nothing that can go pinging off into space, or into someone's soft bodily tissue, which is the usual danger with split rims.

Below are a couple of photos of one "new" tire on the truck. It looks so much better. Now only three more to go and I'll be set for the Fair. Well, I guess one of the old tires should go on the spare wheel also, as it currently has a nasty looking tire on it that has a pancake-size (no, not a dollar pancake) chunk of rubber torn off.

It is now the next day. I figured I'd do one tire a day just to spread out the pain, I mean, the exertion level, so today was tire number two, left front. Wow, look at all them wheel weights. I count fourteen ounces, so nearly a pound of lead to balance out this wheel and tire when it was new.

Here's a shot of the two wheel pieces and the tire. This one came apart very easily, which was quite shocking, since it's probably not been apart in 30 years or more.

This next photo below shows anti-seize on the ten locking ring studs.

Next the locking ring goes on.

And then the nuts.

Number two wheel and tire is done.

Now this is what an army truck is supposed to look like, with army tires on it.

This next photo just shows one "correct" tire on the right (driver's side) and the yucky looking one on the left.

Ok, so I didn't just do one wheel and tire today. The left front went so easy that I was ready for more. This next photo below is tire number three, and shows that I had to pry the inner tube liner away from the wheel, as it had gotten rusted to the wheel.

Number three is done. I failed to get photos of the right rear being done but I didn't want to put all the tools away today after doing two wheels just to drag them out tomorrow to do one more, so I finished up the job today. And once I was done, I was going to get some nice photos of the truck parked out on the lawn but a neighbor came by when he saw this thing sitting outside, and then I forgot. Oh well.