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Williams Fw-07 as produced and the experimental 6 wheel version that ran but was never allowed to race both, stem from the same kit

For over twenty years, I have been pondering and preparing to build a replica of The Surfers dragster. I have now been educated by one Roger Lee as to why my two initial attempts to build the chassis were not right. Turns out that the things I'd read, and heard about the chassis, over the years, didn't provide the whole story. The plans from the old Popular Hot Rodding article are only useful for the front-half of the car, and for the roll cage, itself. The back-half, previously unbeknownst-to-me, was actually a copy of the chassis that Rod Stuckey built for Karamesines (not, as is most commonly written, an RCS/Frank Huszar chassis). Roger provided me a plan for that chassis, along with a couple of notes regarding the chassis. The car was front-halved by RCS, and they moved the differential uprights forward four inches--so, that's where that all came from. Armed with the two drawings, I used my favorite photo program to scale the drawings to one another, gave one some transparency, so I could see what I was doing, and overlaid them. I then imported that composite into AutoCAD, and drew the attached plan, using only the sections of each drawing that were pertinent to the Surfers car. I submitted the new drawing to Roger, and now my chassis drawing is "Riceman certified"! I'm about to head out on a couple of quick errands, but, I'll be melting solder, later this evening. I mentioned that I have been planning this project for many years. I wanted to make this my best piece. I have several new things I want to try with this project, not the least of which is to complete a project with a brass chassis, and an aluminum body. Now, I have done a body in aluminum, and a couple of "playing around" chassis, and I feel confident that I can put it all together!

Looking for some ideas and advice here - what do you guys like to use to widen a set of wheels for a wider tire? An identical wheel makes sense - but it seems a waste to slice up perfectly good wheels if there's a scratchbuilding material that would work. Anyone ever seen a hollow Plastruct bar or similar that's a large enough diameter to help with a job like this? Any good ideas that you all like to use if you need to add some width to a rim?