47-59 Switching from tubed to tubeless tires.

[DieselDog1]

It’s my first time posting as a new member of this forum; greetings to all.

I’d like to tap into the vast knowledge base of the members for guidance.

I have an ALL ORIGINAL ’54 GMC 100. It has the original non-split rim rims on it, 6.50:16 tubed tires. I’m tired of having to pay big money for the NOT SO GOOD, Coker or Classic tires and crappy Chinese made tubes.

I’d like to know if there is something I can do to seal the rivets so the rim would be air-tight and be able to buy tubeless quality light truck tires and run those instead.

An old man who owns a tire shop here told me he thought the rims would OK and not leak and if they did that he could stick in a tube in the tubeless tire and it would be fine. He also mentioned another option, that I could take the rims somewhere and have the area around the rivets sandblasted and then apply epoxy around them to seal.

I’ve heard that there might be a compound that could be used to do this, or a business that I could send my rims to that would do this.

I DO NOT want to buy replacement rims as my goal is to keep the old truck as original as possible.

Thanks in advance, Michael