New Wheels

[nicosorange]

After a long process of tracking down a clean, matching set of Kelsey Hayes wheels (thanks Craig), having them blasted and coated, and explaining to everyone at the tire shop why I was putting these "old" wheels" on instead of 20's with 35's...I finally had them mounted with 31x10.5 bfgs, what do you think? Do I leave them as-is, go with dog dish caps, or full covers?

[viking427]

Those wheels look great as is, and are exactly what you saw on K5 blazers in all the advertising, brochures and on the showrooms of the day. You could add correct dog dishes to "dress" them up a little, but still show the wheels.

[Southcity]

Could not have said it any better than Viking427, those wheels turned out great and your rig looks all the better for it. Nice thing about the dogdish caps, you can run em, go bare or even have a few different sets to change the look up whenever you feel like it. How about a few more pics?

[bouncytruck]

I'm running white steel wheels with dog dish caps. I really dig the look. I'd like to get mine redone like yours so they look bright and clean.

[lolife99]

VERY nice blazer.
Add a set of stainless "dog dish" caps and call it done.

[71swb4x4]

Dog dish those old crappy wheels
I agree with the others, I really like the original wheels. If I had a Blazer it would have white steelies on it too.

[72BlckButy]

Fitting... definitely!

[jimmyballpeen]

Are those 15x8?

[1972CST]

I guess I dont understand what is special about plain steel wheels? These were factory on all Blazers right? What size are they?

[71swb4x4]

What makes them special is that they "were" on the Blazers from the factory, but rarely do you see them now. Most were switched out for wagon spokes, ralleys, or other wheels.

[Tbruz]

Those wheels look awesome!!
I want a set; how hard are they to find?
Tbruz

[BobbyK]

looks great!...dish em

[nicosorange]

southcity - I will try and get more pics and post them up.
Jimmy - they are the factory 15x6...I really like like how they look with a 1050 tire.
Tbruz - for me, it seemed to be a was a challenge to find 5 real factory Kelsey, non-rusted, non-pitted, round, wheels that were worthy of blasting and coating (had to have the pcoater re-do them after the first time had a lot of bubbling in the seams between out and inner rim).

[69-72]

I have been toying with the idea of changing my aluminum slots out for steel wheels but my problem is the wheels would be white, the Blazer is orange and my top is black, think that would look dumb, I haven't seen a black top with white wheels before.


nicosorange, do you happen to know the paint code on your Blazer?

[Firebirdjones]

Originally Posted by 69-72

I have been toying with the idea of changing my aluminum slots out for steel wheels but my problem is the wheels would be white, the Blazer is orange and my top is black, think that would look dumb, I haven't seen a black top with white wheels before.


nicosorange, do you happen to know the paint code on your Blazer?

I don't know, might be a nice contrast.

My 79 pickup is original 2 tone, brown with tan center, and has factory white 16.5's with dog dishes. Looks fine to me.

If in doubt you could go a different route and do the steelies in body color. That's how most of the factory muscle cars did it back in the day.

[Firebirdjones]

Here is a shot (albiet a bad one) of my truck with white steelies. There isn't another white part on the truck and it still looks fine. It's the way it came factory.

[Firebirdjones]

Here is a shot of my 70 formy with body color wheels and dog dishes. That's the way it was done back then, and would be an interesting difference from the norm on a blazer to do this. Something to think about. Really odd ball color combos was not all that unusual back then, I have a couple other muscle cars here that have odd factory color combos. Makes them a real eye catcher nowadays among the sea of black and red cars that pepper a car show.
One in particular is red with a black top, black interior, and white stripes. The other is green with white interior and black stripes. Both are original paint unrestored cars.

[viking427]

GM's color code of the "white" paint used would be helpful too. There must be 50 shades of "white" and 4 shades of sheen (flat, eggshell, satin, gloss). The 69-72 Blazer dog dish caps are out there, but nice examples are getting pretty tough to find. Nice full wheel covers are even getting tough to find.

[Tom Vogel]

Wow.. why dont you do what everyone else is doing???

[wholio]

dont you mean this lol

[viking427]

Originally Posted by Tom Vogel

Wow.. why dont you do what everyone else is doing???

hehehe..

Its refreshing to occasionally see a few examples of factory original or restored Blazers/Jimmys that haven't been notocably jacked with, especially since there isn't an "original/restored" sub-forum on here (as I don't believe there should be - fractures the knowledge base) to cater to those of us who lean a little more toward that interest.

I've seen some beautiful examples of lifted and wheeled 4wd's on here, and I admire the great time, effort and expense that goes into them, but they all start looking the same after a while. This is coming from someone who's modified/customized muscle cars for over 30 years ..and eventually always returned back to stock, oem, original configuration for one reason or another.

[nicosorange]

69-72 - not sure what the paint code is, the SPID says it is supposed to be white...

[wiggins]

I love that look with that color. Cant beat those BFG AT's either. They last forever and are pretty quite.

[Tbruz]

so 15 x 6" is the stock size.
What is the stock backspace supposed to be?
Thanks
Tbruz

[Firebirdjones]

Stock backspace can't be much. I have 3 3/8" backspace currently on mine, and I can barely get a finger between the outer tie rod and the bead of the rim. So it would have to be that or less.

I love steelies with poverty caps. I run my bird that way. Would have always liked a set for the blazer (I have the spare left and that's it).

But finding a good set of four 6 lug steelies isn't easy. Not even sure the poverty caps would be easy to find that are worthy of installing on a nice rig. Plus I've been on an unsprung weight kick I've had aluminum on mine for so long I hate to go back to steel now. I'd rather have 8 inchers anyway.

It's even getting hard to find an aftermarket aluminum will with correct backspacing.

None the less, it's looking good Nicosorange. Would look right at home on mine too