One more question now that I'm thinking of it: Everyone seems to talk about some sort of a spacer on the front axle. Huh? Spacer? Where can I find this?
There are several ways to skin a cat. One way is to use the DRW wheels on the rear, but keep the SRW wheels on the front. With the stock front wheels, you won't need any spacers. The spacer is to make the dually wheel fit right on the front hubs. But realize that if you use SRW front wheels, your front and rear wheels will not be interchangable. But that's no big deal. Corvettes have had different size front and rear wheels for years.
Stock Y2K dually rear wheels are 16x6", with LT235/85R16 tires that have 655 tire revs/mile. So to make the ABS not throw a coniption fit, you must have front tires that also have very close to 655 revs/mile.
Your '07 F-250 could have three different wheels from the factory. If you have 17" wheels, then LT265-70R17 tires have 660 revs/mile. That might be close enough to keep the ABS happy. But better is 18" wheels with LT275-65R18 tires that have 652 revs/mile. If you have Ford 20" wheels, then you'll need to buy new 18" wheels for the front, because I don't think anybody makes a 20" tire with close to 655 revs/mile.
Another combo of tires would be LT255/85R16 on the back (625 revs/mile) and LT275/70R18 on the front (627 revs/mile). You probably already have the LT275/70R18 tires on the front, so you'd just need to buy rear tires in size LT255/85R16. Not many folks make those, but some do: BFGoodrich MudTerrain, Cooper Discoverer SST, Dunlop Radial Rover RVXT, and Toyo makes one but I don't remember the tread pattern.
Because the '99-'04 dually rear wheels are only 6" wide, don't even think of mounting tires bigger than LT255/85R16 on the rear axle. The tire specs say those tires need 6.5" wide wheels, but lots of members of TheDieselStop have run the 255s with no problems. But any bigger tire would require 7" or wider wheels, so don't go there.
You can probably find Ford "take off" wheels at any big wheel retailer. Or you can get them on E-Bay. But caution: if the wheels are not Ford stock wheels, then they will probably be lug centric instead of hub centric reuired for your hubs. The only hub-centric aftermarket wheels I know about are Weld Racing and Alcoa, along with a new guy Ultra Wheel. But Weld and Alcoa no longer make the 16" wheels for our trucks, so pay attention. The center bore must be 4.93" exactly to fit snuggly on the hub. If the center bore is more than that, then you are playing with fire.
The '99-'04 model year wheels will fit your '00 axle. '05-up model year wheels will fit your '07.
There is a big difference in SRW and DRW rear spring packs. 2007 SRW spring packs are rated 7,000 pounds @ground. Y2K DRW spring packs are rated 8,250 pounds @ground. 2007 DRW rear spring packs are rated 9,000 pounds @ground. Did you get the spring packs with the axle? If not, then you'll still have an SRW weight capacity until you replace the rear spring packs.
The whole point of the swap is to increase my towing capacity (tongue weight). I think I'll stick with dualies.
Perhaps you don't know much about super singles?
They make super single tires and wheels that have as much weight capacity as duals. Have you ever looked closely at a concrete mixer/delivery truck? Most have super single tires.
The stock LT235/85R16 tires on that '00 dually rear axle were rated for 2,778 max load per tire, or 5,556 pounds on two duals. So all you have to do is find a tire with about 5,556 pounds weight capacity to match the weight capacity of the stock tires. But you don't need nearly that much tire capacity if you don't severely overload your rig. Shoot for a minimum of 4,000 pounds weight capacity per rear tire, and that's about 13,000 pounds of total weight on the truck. The GVWR of the 2000 dually was 11,200, so 13k means you'd be overloaded.
A good fit for your rig if you want losts of extra weight capacity would be Michelin XZE2+ tires in size 265/70R19.5. 5,510 weight capacity, and your 4.30 rear end would feel like a 3.98. Requires only 7.5" wide rims, so that's more reasonable than for the bigger tires. 5,510 weight capacity is over 11,000 pounds on the rear axle, so that's a lot more weight capacity that you'll ever need. If you put 10,000 pounds on your rear axle you'll be grossing several thousand pounds more than the GVWR of a 2000 dually. That's what I call severely overloaded.
In other words, that 265/70R19.5 tire is all you need to replace the two tires on each end of your axle.
But if it were mine, I'd probably go with Michelin XRV 245/70R19.5 tires on custom 6.75" wide rims. 4,080 pounds weight capacity per tire, so more than the 4,000 needed. The 4.30 rear end would feel like a 4.10, which is fine for any trailer that won't exceed the GCWR of the truck.
Michelin Americas Truck Tires XRV® Page
That's just two examples of a super single tire. Almost any "big truck" tire will have a weight capacity more than 4,000 pounds when mounted on a single rim.So go with the smallest adequate super single rear tire with new custom rims, and you probably won't need dually rear fenders.
That 245/70R19.5 tire has 625 tire revs/mile. Several regular 16", 17" and 18" LT tires have about 625 revs/mile, so you won't have to put those expensive truck tires on the front axle unless you want to.
