Long story long. My wife surprised me with a 04 Night Train this spring as a 25 year father's day/glad you beat cancer present. Yep, she is pretty bad ***. Having worked in the industry on the clothing side years and years ago as a rep(remember Billy Lane and his Colab with Sha-sha shoes, and the Johnny Suede clothing company) I always wanted a bigger rear end under a softail. Well she found it and had it delivered. 04 train with a 200 mil rear under a Roland Sands kit. Whoever built this did a good job and spent some coin making it nice, other than the West Coast pipes, and drag bars, we can argue that another time, I was fairly content.
coming home the other night my rear end gets weird, brake shimmies and the bike doesn't slow down AT ALL! I get home find aluminum dust all over the rear wheel 18x5.5 ULTIMA smoothie. Up on the stand it goes. I press the rear brake the rotor grabs the wheel turns...FML! Go inside grab a beer help with homework and go to bed.
the next morning I peel the rear wheel off and remove the pulley, and 5 and a half allen bolts fall out, one was broken in half. .. The bearings are good, the mating faces of the hub and rim aren't great but some file work and a bit of clean up and they are OK. The local bolt supplier has the right bolts, i chase the threads grab my trusty gallon of red locktite and go to town. Everything goes back together perfectly, I don't even have to take the brake rotor off to get it all back in. Confidence in repair 100 confidence in wheel not nearly as high.
Now we're to the point I need YOUR HELP! Why in the hell is finding a new rear wheel such a mess? I know I'm into something a little unique and a bit out of fashion but I did read the first 55 pages of the tire and wheel forum. How do I find a wheel that I can replace this one with without having to build pvc spacers and fit and refit things? The swing arm is stock, the rear brake fits exactly how it did from the factory, i can't tell if it's been machined anywhere. I work in the nuclear world hunting for isotopes that will kill you in seconds but, this seems even harder! The hub under the pulley said 18x5.5 but 3 3/4+2 5/8=6 3/8 plus whatever the rim width is... I'm so confused... HELP PLEASE!!!

Drive side pulley to wheel center

belt measurement

brake rotor to wheel center measurement

Side view

rear view appears centered

 

Why not just install thread inserts into existing wheel ?

It`ll be stronger than new

 

I hadn't thought of that. Definitely worth looking into, thanks. The need to learn something and understand it is killing me too.