19.5 high clearance srw rims

[Mickeymotormount]

Hey guys. Years ago I had a GMC 3500 Longhorn with 19.5 tubeless rims. I have sold the truck years ago () to keep the bride happy.

I am in search of the same rims for my 67 C20 build. I know they were available on P30 step vans and optioned on some pickups of that era.

Anyone know of a source for these in the Northeast? I have seen them on Ebay and Facebook Marketplace. I was hoping to find a set a little closer.

Thanks in advance to all!!

[special-K]

Can't help you, but I like your style. Good luck, I wish you luck in your search

[factorystock]

Originally Posted by special-K

Can't help you, but I like your style. Good luck, I wish you luck in your search

X2! Hard to find and pricey, but the old school no nonsense look is priceless. '67 and '68's, have unique features that should be appreciated, if you got it, flaunt it ( look how those caps pop out of those rims ). Lot of food trucks ( bread trucks ) run the 8R-19.5, stay away from metric low profile tires.https://www.amazon.com/Double-Coin-R...9842433&sr=8-2 After clicking on this link, a microsoft edge link came up with $180.75 a piece.

[Mickeymotormount]

Originally Posted by factorystock

X2! Hard to find and pricey, but the old school no nonsense look is priceless. '67 and '68's, have unique features that should be appreciated, if you got it, flaunt it ( look how those caps pop out of those rims ). Lot of food trucks ( bread trucks ) run the 8R-19.5, stay away from metric low profile tires.https://www.amazon.com/Double-Coin-R...9842433&sr=8-2 After clicking on this link, a microsoft edge link came up with $180.75 a piece.

Thanks for the link Factorystock. And that picture is the look I am trying to achieve with my orange/white 67 C20. Wow even the truck in the pic is a '67 with the large back window option.

[72c20customcamper]

I like the way they look. I'm keeping the 17s on my 68 with bias ply mudders on it keep the farm truck look since that's where it came from

[KQQL IT]

https://www.boarwheel.com/8-lug-rancher-19-5x6-75/

Seems reasonable

[Mickeymotormount]

Thanks for the replies guys.

Here is exactly what I am looking for, only closer to home.

[burnin oil]

You may want to check the cost of tires before making that decision. One of my trucks has factory 19.5s and decent imports like kumho are pushing $400 a piece for a non highway tread. I know that there are some light duty tires making it to market now for the diesel truck crowd but last I checked they were pretty expensive also. My 5500 is averaging 20k miles a set and has had kumho, Hankook, and Goodyears on it and is due for set number 4 at 80k miles. This truck does wiegh 12k pounds empty. I want out from under the 19.5s but semi tires are my only option and wheel adapters are over a grand themselves and tires are around $600 each. The p30 rims are usually expensive when you can find them. Good luck.

[Mickeymotormount]

Originally Posted by burnin oil

You may want to check the cost of tires before making that decision. One of my trucks has factory 19.5s and decent imports like kumho are pushing $400 a piece for a non highway tread. I know that there are some light duty tires making it to market now for the diesel truck crowd but last I checked they were pretty expensive also. My 5500 is averaging 20k miles a set and has had kumho, Hankook, and Goodyears on it and is due for set number 4 at 80k miles. This truck does wiegh 12k pounds empty. I want out from under the 19.5s but semi tires are my only option and wheel adapters are over a grand themselves and tires are around $600 each. The p30 rims are usually expensive when you can find them. Good luck.

Thanks for your concerns. This truck will only be a weekend cruiser once in a while. I will investigate the cost of the tires like you said, however.

[jocko]

I would not recommend using 19.5 trailer wheels. Might be worth checking in with members oem4me, yelmer, or 60-66. I’d say that about half the 19.5s I’ve ever seen in existence have been on their trucks. Very, very hard to find. I spent quite some time tracking down a hodge-podged set of five 17.5 wheels. Finding what you seek locally will severely limit your market, unless you get lucky. If you’re determined, I’d open up the aperture, accept shipping cost pain, and scour CL, eBay, and post a WTB on this forum. If anyone has them stashed, they are probably members here. I think you are more likely to find them on the 60-66 side of the house.

[Mickeymotormount]

Not going to use trailer wheels. Looking for Kelsey-Hayes made rims GM used in the 1960s. Thanks for your insight about where to look. I will check around the forum to see what I can dig up.

[factorystock]

Last word of advice, make sure they are the "60's type 19.5" with the more positive offset, the "late 50's type 19.5" had the "flatter" style wheels.

[HO455]

And to make things harder they also were available on Internationals, Dodges and Fords too. I got my 17.5's from a Dodge guy because the Dodge hubcaps didn't fit.

This website may be able to help. I know they are a long ways away but they might have an east coast connection or be able to help with IDing the Chevrolet versions.

https://akhwheels.com/

Good luck. I love that look too.

[factorystock]

Originally Posted by HO455

And to make things harder they also were available on Internationals, Dodges and Fords too.

Those makes did offer 19.5" wheels, but those wheels used inner bumps for hubcap retention, they only accept IH, Dodge and Ford hubcaps, not GM hubcaps. Wheels built for GM specifications had clips that accept period GM hubcaps.

[Mickeymotormount]

Originally Posted by HO455

This website may be able to help. I know they are a long ways away but they might have an east coast connection or be able to help with IDing the Chevrolet versions.

https://akhwheels.com/

Good luck. I love that look too.

Thanks for the tip. I did check there when I first got the truck(a year ago). They had 4 of them for $1200 plus shipping. I decided to wait until I was ready to start working on the truck. That time has now come and I am on the lookout for some.

[jocko]

Originally Posted by Mickeymotormount

Not going to use trailer wheels.

Assumed not, but just mentioned because they were linked in post #3. Good luck with your search, I really like the look of the stock 19.5s on the older trucks in this era (and the 60-66 era).

[Stephen717]

Check at Elwood's Auto exchange in Smithsburg Maryland right between Frederick and Hagerstown, whenever I'd go there when I lived in the area I'd check in at the front and tell them what I was looking for and they would send me either to an area in their main yard or across the street to their secondary yard. They have just about everything from the 1930s on up

[Mickeymotormount]

Originally Posted by Stephen717

Check at Elwood's Auto exchange in Smithsburg Maryland right between Frederick and Hagerstown, whenever I'd go there when I lived in the area I'd check in at the front and tell them what I was looking for and they would send me either to an area in their main yard or across the street to their secondary yard. They have just about everything from the 1930s on up

Stephen, thanks for the heads up. I will definitely search there. Who knows, maybe I'll get lucky.

['68OrangeSunshine]

My '68 C/10 Stepside was originally optioned with 5.25x17.5 -- 6 lug 5.5 bolt circle rims and 7.00x17.5 bias tires. Mid '70s 7.00 tires were hard to get, so I went to 8.00. In the '80s, Radials were new, and I went with 8R-17.5LTs. Turn of the Last Century, they told me my 17.5 rims were shot. I could not find replacements.
Tire shop talked me into 6 x 16 rims and 235/85/R16 tires. I liked them OK.
Last April, I got clipped square on the right rear. I looked for 6x16 white spoke rims. Nada.
I paid a ''wheelwright'' $80 to true my 6x16 rim. [Tire was fine.] When the tire was off the rim, I saw I had been running on Trailer Rims for over 100,000 miles and 20+ years. Well for a half-ton that runs mostly unloaded, they work OK. So I hunted down a new trailer 6x16 rim, and found one for $68.

While I like the idea of getting my OEM 17.5 rims ''re-hooped'' I'm not sure I can still get 8R-17.5 tires.
After I lost one OEM hubcap, I pulled the rest. Now I only have one. But I was never keen on hubcaps anyway.

[Mickeymotormount]

Originally Posted by '68OrangeSunshine

My '68 C/10 Stepside was originally optioned with 5.25x17.5 -- 6 lug 5.5 bolt circle rims and 7.00x17.5 bias tires. Mid '70s 7.00 tires were hard to get, so I went to 8.00. In the '80s, Radials were new, and I went with 8R-17.5LTs. Turn of the Last Century, they told me my 17.5 rims were shot. I could not find replacements.
Tire shop talked me into 6 x 16 rims and 235/85/R16 tires. I liked them OK.
Last April, I got clipped square on the right rear. I looked for 6x16 white spoke rims. Nada.
I paid a ''wheelwright'' $80 to true my 6x16 rim. [Tire was fine.] When the tire was off the rim, I saw I had been running on Trailer Rims for over 100,000 miles and 20+ years. Well for a half-ton that runs mostly unloaded, they work OK. So I hunted down a new trailer 6x16 rim, and found one for $68.

While I like the idea of getting my OEM 17.5 rims ''re-hooped'' I'm not sure I can still get 8R-17.5 tires.
After I lost one OEM hubcap, I pulled the rest. Now I only have one. But I was never keen on hubcaps anyway.

Wow, I would have figured you'd be able to find them in the Southwest. I always see pictures of junkyards there that have all kinds of old stuff. You just don't see junkyards like those in the Northeast.

['68OrangeSunshine]

Originally Posted by Mickeymotormount

Wow, I would have figured you'd be able to find them in the Southwest. I always see pictures of junkyards there that have all kinds of old stuff. You just don't see junkyards like those in the Northeast.

A number of factors have killed the vast seas of great vintage truck parts that once dominated the desert landscape.
1] The Internet. Because of the lower cost of living here, the greater prices offered by Rust Belt restorers for AZ-Rust Free parts has caused a drain on local availability. A lot of the yards have been fished-out. Due to web access, digitized inventories are more available to outsiders [read Back East] than locals. I have heard of 67-72 hoarders who won't even sell to locals. They want the big bucks the snowbirds will pay.
2] High prices for scrap steel. With higher prices on good grade Detroit steel. Scrappers cashed in and crushed as much as they could for the bottom dollar.
3] Higher real estate prices. A lot of the old junk yard properties made better sense on paper being cleared of rusty iron, and converted to industrial parks or even condominiums.

And on a much narrower scale, 6 lug 5.5'' bolt circle 5.25x17.5 factory rims were pretty rare, even when new. 50-something years later they are extinct.
Perhaps their rarity contributed to their demise. Not enough call for- or interest in an oddball size, for used tire and rim sellers to want to keep them. Probably got scrapped as, ''Nobody will ever want this weird size.''
About 20 years ago, a Board Member [no names here] offered to sell me the 17.5 spare from his Suburban. He wanted a lot for it, and couldn't be bothered to take the overage bias ply tire off and just ship me the rim. The original tire might've had mint tread, but rubber that old was suspect and unsafe. Shipping for a whole mounted tire would have been a lot too. So I didn't take the deal.
I still have my OEM spare -- hardly used, and still in Argent Silver*, and a black Firestone rim, the same size, but a different Dodge center. The other four 5.25x17.5 were judged ''spent'' 100,000 miles ago. I'm not sure if the lug holes are bored out to excess by wear, or the ''hoops'' are dinged in from a lot of curb-hopping and trail driving offroad -- or both. I was simply told they were shot by the tire shop guys. [Who could have had an ulterior motive in selling me new rims. IDK.] *In 1977, when I rebuilt the first 292, I spray-canned the OEM rims with White Krylon. It was a fad.
I did like the white rims and white face '68 front grille trim together.
Then there's the availability of affordable 8R-17.5LT tires question...
Oh Yeah. Tire Rack lists Hankook 215/75/R17.5 for only $329.73 each. No other selections.

[factorystock]

Originally Posted by '68OrangeSunshine

A number of factors have killed the vast seas of great vintage truck parts that once dominated the desert landscape.

I agree with everything mentioned. Times definitely have changed. The local scene has really dried out for everything pre '80's. Parts are still out there, but nobody's giving anything away anymore. STA shows both highway and traction tread for 8-17.5 in bias 8 ply, but nothing in 19.5 bias.https://www.stausaonline.com/product...t-truck-tires/

['68OrangeSunshine]

Originally Posted by factorystock

I agree with everything mentioned. Times definitely have changed. The local scene has really dried out for everything pre '80's. Parts are still out there, but nobody's giving anything away anymore. STA shows both highway and traction tread for 8-17.5 in bias 8 ply, but nothing in 19.5 bias.https://www.stausaonline.com/product...t-truck-tires/

Twenty someting years ago, I went on a roadtrip to the Bay Area. For me it was a Quest For K/5 Parts. I got a Rider. It happily coincided with a wedding in the same county for my buddy's kin. So he rode shotgun. We had a great time.
In Richmond. [just across the Bay from Fremont] a local guy sold me a solid Windshield Frame and some other small. but-missing things. Down in old Chinatown an Arab/American Brother had some Blazer Hatch Locks, Relays, and Latches I needed for my Jimmy Hatch repair.

Sometimes you gotta go long to get the goodies.


Wait -- who's STA?

[theastronaut]

If you find a set too far away to drive, look into Greyhound for shipping. They're very reasonable on larger items.

['68OrangeSunshine]

The way they are now, they're exactly like the hubcaps that were on my '68 C/10 Stepside when I bought it in 1973.
Red/Orange Bowtie over Argent Silver with Black trim.
In almost 50 years of running my truck, I only have one hubcap left.