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Dangers of welding wheels.

Chris5500

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Joined
Oct 23, 2009
Messages
217
Location
Australia
Occupation
Plant Mechanic
Yep, very scary. And just think what would happen on a much larger tire like the ones used in mining.
 

John C.

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Jun 11, 2007
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Northwest
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Machinery & Equipment Appraiser
Very interesting. I never knew there was a chemical process that would cause that. It would have helped if the narrator had stated and range of temperature where that process begins.

I can only imagine scraper or big haul truck tires being worked in the desert, especially on long hauls. I've had oilers and mechanics crawling all over them not knowing if or where the bomb was.
 

Cmark

Senior Member
Joined
Jan 2, 2009
Messages
3,176
Location
Australia
Great video.

It would have been good to get some tips on how to avoid it. He's telling us that even if you deflate the tyre and break the bead, it can still happen.

I know it's best practise to inflate tyres with nitrogen, but will nitrogen inflation prevent this? In other words is oxygen (air) necessary for this reaction or are the compounds in the rubber sufficient?

I'm sweating now over the thought of the amount of wheel-nuts I've cut off over the years, even though I always deflate the tyres.
 

Truckin4life

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Joined
Feb 10, 2010
Messages
47
Location
Lubbock, TX
Occupation
Concrete Plant Operator.
Great video.

It would have been good to get some tips on how to avoid it. He's telling us that even if you deflate the tyre and break the bead, it can still happen.

I know it's best practise to inflate tyres with nitrogen, but will nitrogen inflation prevent this? In other words is oxygen (air) necessary for this reaction or are the compounds in the rubber sufficient?

I'm sweating now over the thought of the amount of wheel-nuts I've cut off over the years, even though I always deflate the tyres.

Once the wheel is cool, then all is fine. If you pop the bead then have the tire half off the wheel, again your fine. I dont think nitrogen would help in this case, as it is a chemical reaction with in the rubber tire its self that causes the heat leading to the massive pressure increase, seems like heat dissipating through the wheel prorbably helps the process along quite quickly.
 

stock

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Aug 4, 2008
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Eire
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We have moved on and now were lost....
Once the wheel is cool, then all is fine. If you pop the bead then have the tire half off the wheel, again your fine. I dont think nitrogen would help in this case, as it is a chemical reaction with in the rubber tire its self that causes the heat leading to the massive pressure increase, seems like heat dissipating through the wheel prorbably helps the process along quite quickly.

Might want to watch it again especially where he tells that a man was killed even though they had the valve pulled and the bead unseated,but because of the rapid change in the temperature it re-inflated itself to destruction killing one and injuring the other. Scary to think how many times I welded rims on tractors to keep the show moving well never again ever.
 

Tiny

Senior Member
Joined
Jan 24, 2010
Messages
2,126
Location
NW Missouri
Never had a clue,welded and heated wheels before. :eek: Just forwarded this to the company I work for, For review
 

oarwhat

Senior Member
Joined
Dec 14, 2009
Messages
824
Location
buffalo,n.y.
Wish I had seen the video before I became the poster boy

man I wish I had seen that video!! Back in 1983 our tandem dumps were cracking the front rims and then leaking. They were the big float radials 18:00 x 22.5. We had welded a few before this, we would weld the leak and run a bead all the way around the rim. Late on a friday I welded the leak and filled it to check if it was ok. I came in saturday and decided I would leave the air in and weld a little at a time and let it cool in between. Well I shut the welder off and forgot what I wanted to do, so I felt the tire and decided to weld some more. Got carried away and welded all the way around:Banghead:Banghead. The only reason I'm typing this today is I had to weld were the valve stem is and wanted to tilt the rim. I reached back to grab a block an it blew. I was by myself and walking around I thought a board hit my head my ears were ringing so bad. I the realized what happend and saw the tire was gone. This was before 911 I didn't want to upset my mom so I tried to read the phone book but couldn't. I called her and the firemen came in about 3 minutes.
I'm a very lucky man , the rim made a 1" deep groove in the concrete. The power it took to make a 1" groove in one shot from what 2" above the floor is incredable. It flew up 16' bent the bar joist and roof deck and fell on my brothers motorcycle and trashed it. I had a severely broken wrist (4.5 hours of surgery), broken orbital bone under the eye and a ruptured ear drum. I spent ten days in the hospital. Lucky wow. People wonder why allot of things don't bother me well believe me I know life's to short to sweat the small stuff. Now get this!!! Our tire guy says yea there was a fire in there but it looks ok. So he remounts it and we ran it till it wore out!!!!! I can't make this stuff up. I would never walk near that tire ever. Randy
 

littleplows

Member
Joined
Sep 20, 2007
Messages
22
Location
Erie, PA
Occupation
Business Owner - Recycling Natural Waste, Snowplow
And here I thought I was dumb for removing the tire from the rim before welding on it. To think there was a more dangerous way to do this type of repair. Must be in the water. We like to live.

Been to McDonalds for some coffee recently all the cups say caution hot. (DUH)

I have to say though its good to have a video out there like that some of the kids growing up these days are missing a little common sense. Not saying that I havn't done my share of dumb sh!t.
 

oarwhat

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Dec 14, 2009
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824
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buffalo,n.y.
Believe me I feel stupid for doing it , I figured I'd just weld a bit at a time and I got carried away. I was 25 and always in a rush, figured nothing bad would ever happen to me, etc. I've heard of two other local guys that did the same thing and they got killed doing it. After the fact it's just plain stupid I didn't at least let the air out. My lawyer wanted to sue firestone because the rim didn't have ,do not weld stamped on it. I told him to forget it just a stupid mistake on my part. The new rims we bought had it stamped on them. If that happened today every lawyer around would be calling me. Randy
 
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JDOFMEMI

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Jan 3, 2007
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3,074
Location
SoCal
The only thing worse than that you can do with a tire is fill it with oxygen. I knew a guy at a filling station once who was fixing a backhoe tire. His air compressor broke, and he needed to get the tire aired up and the machine running, so he made up some adapters and filled it out of his oxygen bottle for the cutting torch.

Fortunately when it blew, he was not right next to it, but he suffered a similar experience to oarwhat. He is lucky to still be here.
 

td25c

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Joined
Feb 14, 2009
Messages
5,250
Location
indiana
Safety Film

The Bridgestone film was interesting,I dont believe the tire would blow that fast as in the film, they only welded for 10 or 12 seconds on the wheel.No doubt if you welded long ,or heated enough the tire will finally blow,but not in that short of time.I just dont buy it.It's a safety issue for sure, but I dont deflate a tire just to put some heat on a stuck stud or nut .They also left out the danger of using starting fluid to seat a tire bead.:D
 

lynchy

Active Member
Joined
Dec 30, 2009
Messages
32
Location
Cumbria,uk
Occupation
Plant operator
first place i worked after leaving school,the welder,who was experienced,but not much with plant,welding on truck wheel,removed from trailer,wheel/tyre heated and exploded,wheel rim hit workshop roof,about 30 ft, blew welder under bench,BUT left lying with leg outstretched,rim shot back to floor hitting his leg,very badly broken,almost needed amputation,bad limp and long time off work,tyres are very easy to take for granted/miss use,can't believe one of the other fitters didn't warn him,hard lesson to learn!
 
Joined
Mar 4, 2010
Messages
12
Location
Georgia
Thanks for sharing the video.

Call me too safety conscious if you like but I would completely remove the tire when I weld. Yes the explosion is dangerous but so is a fire. Rubber burns like crazy once you get it started.

Scott
Welders360
 

OFF

Senior Member
Joined
Sep 30, 2009
Messages
1,047
Location
Alberta, Canada
Occupation
HD Mechanic
Thank you for sharing. We heat rims all the time to get them off the rear hubs on Ford 1 tons. I had no idea this could happen.
 
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Chris5500

Well-Known Member
Joined
Oct 23, 2009
Messages
217
Location
Australia
Occupation
Plant Mechanic
In Australia safety bulletins and incident reports are passed around different mines on a regular basis to educate people and make them aware of hazards that they would not normally associate as being one. Guaranteed, every couple of months there’s one there about someone being seriously injured or killed by heating or welding on a rim.

The last one I saw was pretty horrific, looking at the photo's you'd swear there were two people involved, but upon closer inspection you can actually see it's just the torso and legs of one man on different sides of the workshop.

Slightly different to heating and welding on rims I know, but most mines these days park the fleet up if lightening strikes within the open pit boundary. I’m sure you’ve all seen the photo’s on why they do this.
 

jughead

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Nov 1, 2007
Messages
284
Location
soddy-daisy tn.
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retired
did the welding thing on a ford rim 4-5 years back with just the air out. didnt know about this until about 3 weeks ago. i guess i am still here for a reason. nothing happened but NEVER again.
 
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