My Fugitive has been built with a good combination of Beetle ball joint front an Bus IRS at the back, great for off road use.
Has anyone else got this setup and how have you coped with the stud patterns.
I cant get new chrome buggy wheels for the back in bus stud pattern and it is not possible to get adapters because the two patterns overlap.
Crative engineering can make brand new hubs with any stud pattern you want but they are too expensive for my budget (although to be fair they are not expensive for the work involved in manufacturing them).

Any advice / tips welcome.

Cheers

I've got all the necessary taps if you want to redrill B)

It cant be redrilled as it is not possible to fit the old and new stud patterns on the same part.
I confirmed this by making a CAD drawing and rotating one stud pattern and sure enough as the suppliers of adapters had said there is no position where they dont overlap.

Any more ideas welcome.

Thanks

when you say overlap - do you mean the 130mm PCD 4 bolt beetle pattern overlaps the ???PCD 5 bolt bus pattern?.........so I think your saying you will be drilling into half a hole?........if this is the case then no problem - plug the offending hole with a cast iron/steel threaded plug - a wheel bolt will be OK - and locktite it in place with red locktite (its like welding!) - then drill and tap to the new 130mm 4-bolt PCD - with a drilling jig to prevent drill wander...........

I once re-drilled a set of 1303 hubs to accept a 5 bolt pattern to accept the Fuch type looking wheels from a Vauxhall carlton GSI3000 - and I had the exaxt same overlap problem - this was not much of a problem for me as I used to work in a machine shop, and I had access to a bridgeport vertical mill with a digilal readout, and acess to a lathe and a BIG pillar drill and all the special taps.......

to cut a long story short - its quite an involved job - making a drilling jig that bolted to the hub was the hardest part - once you have the drilling jig - drilling and tapping out all of the hubs is straight forward - but be warned you need a sensible size of a pillar drill so you can clamp down the hub nice and safely - the one I used was about 15 feet tall with a 3 foot square table - OK a bit OTT! - a £40 job from B&Q might not be capable - but it might be if you are gentle with the drill sizes

the taps are also non standard thread sizes, therefore expensive, so Tiggars offer should not be missed! - if you feel capable of doing the work yourself - go for it - otherwise expect to pay sensible money

Although I have access to the equipment this idea wont work because the 5 x 112 pattern hub has 5 thick cast areas on the back for the studs, redrilling would mean that some of the studs will be in areas where the casting is thin.
Also I dont agree that a plugged hole redrilled half way across is strong enough to be safe.
Especially in this case when I will be reducing from 5 studs to 4 and also going off road.

Thanks anyway.

hmmmm......people have been re-drilling 4 stud beetle discs and hubs to porsche 5 stud pattern for years with out any adverse effects - but I understand what your saying about going off road and giving them a good hammering - and the big difference in size going from a smaller PCD to a bigger PCD.......drilling into a studded hole is a fine engineering solution - its a common repair procedure - as long as there are no notches - which there physically cant be in this instance - therefore cracks cant start - it worked fine for me!

sounds like your better off looking a bit harder for some wide 5 stud bus rims.......or could you not get some standard rims widened - I think the word they use is "banded"

If you are using it off road and do not want to drill the hubs why not redrill the wheels ? Weller eight spokes are beefy with plenty of meat to redrill 5 x 112 :P

redrilling 4 stud wheels would give the same problem of an overlapping hole so I cant do it unfortunately.
One avenue I tried was to contact Weller, Les Weller said he couldnt make the wheels I want at the minute, he may be retooling and be able to do them in a couple of years time.
I am looking to keep the car fitted with chrome buggy wheels as fitted now so I cant use a different type of wheel such as a standard one widened, If I was going to fit another type of wheel then some merc rims would probably be suitable but I would never get similar style 4 stud ones for the front. Also banded wheels are illegal for road use since people used to home make dangerous ones in the 70s.

So far it looks like I am stuck with rusty old rims at the back.

Another idea I had is to fit Trekker reduction boxes at the back, then I would have 5 x 205 pattern and could easily buy adapters to 4 stud.
Does anyone know if Trekker reduction boxes will fit on a Bay Bus IRS?

Thanks for the ideas folks.

You could make / have made adapters if you can handle a track increase of around 1" per side.

I had a similar problem fitting a set of white spoke wheels with a 5 stud Chevy pattern to my 4 stud standard beetle IRS hubs.

I got some adapters from Machine 7 that come from the states, to get over the overlap problem they supply 1 extra long eccentricly machined double ended stud that fits in 1 lug hole and converts the stud center, you then use 3 short screws to screw the adapter plate to the remaining 3 lug holes the adapter has 4 built in studs for the Chevy pattern and the previously fitted offset stud comes into alignment for the 5th.

With the Cad it should be easy to draw something up, the only tricky bit would be making the eccentric double stud. It sounds like you may have access to a machine shop ?

Trekker reduction box's......nah-h stay away from them even off road. They will reducegive your top speed by about 40mph !!! :o

easier than that simply find yourself a set of backing plates and rear drums off a '68 -'70 Baywindow Van. The 205/5 drums were carried over from the splitscreen for at least the first two years. I'm sure with a bit of jiggling you could even fit up a pair of drums to your existing backing plates once you remove the drum and hub :D

Hmm
I ve seen those, they are not offered for the combination I am using probably because the Bus IRS has studs in the hub instead of tapped holes, but maybe it can be done by removing a stud, tapping to a larger size and making the offset stud to suit.
It is quite a bit of work but might be the way to go
Cheers

Another good idea!
Does anyone know if the 5 x 205 hub will fit onto the splined shaft of the later setup?
If the spline is the same Im sure that by buying a complete used rear brake hub setup it could be adapted to fit.

The two trailing arm assemblies are identical....but the later has the brake upgrade with seperate hubs and drums. I say upgrade but it was only for the newer type wheel, and the seperate hub meant you could look at your brake shoes without needing to undo that 46mm gland nut each time...no idea if you use the existing backing plates, you may need spacer but if you use the whole assy it 'should' bolt straight on... B)

I think that this is the best way to go.
I will be keeping my eye open for a cheap wide 5 IRS and just give it a go.
Once done I will fit easy to get adapters to 4 stud.
Thanks for all of the ideas.
I will keep you posted, it might be a while though.

Cheers