Do you think I can use spacers here?

[Dino]

I'd like to push my wheels out a bit for looks. Additionally I'm hoping that by moving them out I'll be able to fit 13" rotors and big calipers in there.

How much do you think I can get away with? I guess 1/2" would do to clear the calipers. I don't know if I should go a whole lot more in the rear, but I think the fronts can move a bit more. Maybe try an inch all around or 1" up front and 1/2" in the rear? The more the better for looks but I don't want to risk rubbing the fender lip or wheel wells and I probably should limit the thickness of the spacer as well, although I'm still not sure if this is really an issue with a good quality spacer.

Sorry, I know it's not ideal to figure out looking at pictures, but maybe some of you will have a good idea. The car is on stands so I'm unable to take any measurements.

[garner7555]

In the truck world a lot of people run spacers on duallies between the rear wheels so that they can run larger tires without the sidewalls touching.   They swear by "hub centric spacers".   Do a little research on them, they center themselves on the hub, and hold the wheel centered like the hub would.   

http://www.ebay.com/itm/2-X-CUSTOM-HUBCENTRIC-WHEEL-SPACERS-ADAPTER-5x114-3-64-1-CB-M12X1-5-20MM-5X4-5-/291909008911?_trksid=p2385738.m2548.l4275

[Dino]

Great! Whatever makes them safe! What's the Mopar hub size again? 70mm?

[redgum78]

Are you legal to use these on the roads in the USA?

Fairly sure wheel spacers are illegal here in Australia. We have to use offset rims.

[Dino]

Are you legal to use these on the roads in the USA?

Fairly sure wheel spacers are illegal here in Australia. We have to use offset rims.

Yeah nobody cares here. Cars are not checked at all. You should see what's on the road here. I was behind a truck a few days ago and was wondering what was flapping in the wind. When I passed him, the entire rear quarter had rusted away at the rocker and wheel well. It was only attached at the top and front of the bed.   

That said, safety first. I do intend to drive this car a lot (if I ever get it back together), and I don't want to be afraid of taking a turn. I really don't want to change wheels, I like these.

[redgum78]

Are you legal to use these on the roads in the USA?

Fairly sure wheel spacers are illegal here in Australia. We have to use offset rims.

Yeah nobody cares here. Cars are not checked at all. You should see what's on the road here. I was behind a truck a few days ago and was wondering what was flapping in the wind. When I passed him, the entire rear quarter had rusted away at the rocker and wheel well. It was only attached at the top and front of the bed.   

That said, safety first. I do intend to drive this car a lot (if I ever get it back together), and I don't want to be afraid of taking a turn. I really don't want to change wheels, I like these.

I wish our rules here were not quite so strict. Lots of them are in place for good reason but they seem to have taken it too far with some things! Personally I don't have issue with wheel spacers up to 1/2 inch. I think above that there is a possibility of over stressing the wheel studs depending on the type of spacer and stud arrangement. I think they were banned over here because people were fitting home made spacers, washers and other dodgy things to pack the wheels out. They just made a blanket ban on them in my state. I have been out of the road worthy inspection game for a while now so they may now allow engineered and approved spacers to be used?
Anyway I wandered of topic! I cant help with how much spacer you need but I agree those wheels would look awesome hanging out a tad more.

[Dino]

They do make very nice machined spacers now but I'm thinking the same; more than 1/2" might be pushing it. I think any movement of those wheels outward would be a plus!

[timmycharger]

Wow! Sorry, can't comment on the spacers as I don't know, but I don't recall ever seeing a full pic of your Charger.  She's a beauty Dirk!

[Dino]

Thanks Mike! She wears some battle scars but she's solid!

[Draco]

  I have half inch. rear spacers on my car, but not on the front. I had two spend some time finding the right lug nuts to get enough threads that I felt comfortable with.

[alfaitalia]

They are perfectly legal in the UK too....Just make sure you use the hubcentric sort...anything else is an accident waiting to happen. I used 1.5 inch alloy hubcentric spacers on my Grand Cherokee for years without issue...got that old Jeep off the floor on more than one occasion too! Just check the torque once in a while and use red loctite on the spacer retaining bolts and it will be golden.

[Kern Dog]

The further you place the wheel away from the hub, the more stress you place on the wheel studs. The center hub obviously does not serve its function anymore in regards to being a support for the wheel.
In factory form, the center hub and center hole in the wheel fit together to provide support for the wheel. The lugs and nuts secure the wheel. The Magnum wheels were a departure and some of them have balancing problems as a result of this.
The aftermarket defaults to a larger center hole to allow the wheel centers to fit a variety of cars. Ford uses the same 4.5 bolt circle we do but their wheel bearing size is smaller. This is why a stock Mopar wheel fits a Ford but the Ford wheel won't sit flush against the drum or rotor. These aftermarket wheels are now relying entirely on the wheel studs to carry the load of the vehicle. Lucky for us, 5 lugs of 1/2" diameter is enough. If you use spacers, you are moving the clamping force outward by that amount. An engineer would be able to determine the risk but my ass dyno tells me that it would be better to use bolt on billet adapters. They would allow a full lug engagement for both the spacer itself and the wheel.

[alfaitalia]

Hubcentric spacers that we are talking about are billet spacers...they use the original bolts/studs to hold the spacers to the hub and nuts attach the wheels to bolts that come out from the spacers the other way. The sort that use longer studs that just pass through them are only safe to a thickness that allows the wheel to centre properly on the hub spigot...so on most cars that wont be much more than about 5mm.

A wheel bolts only job should be to hold the wheel tight to the hub. The load bearing should be on the spigot via a tight fitting wheel centre bore....there should be next to no weight putting side loads on the bolts. If you don't use hubcentric spacers then the bolts/lugs have high side loadings on them that they were not designed for. Also the wheel don't tend to sit exactly central making wheel near impossible to feel balanced. This in turn will, over time loosen the bolts....not a great thing on the freeway!!! Even if you DONT use spacers but have aftermarket wheel with larger than stock centre bores you should use alloy or plastic spigot rings (cheap) to fill the gap between the wheel and the hub spigot.....dangerous not to.

[Dino]

Thanks for that info!  

So ideally I have adapters that bolt onto the stock wheels studs, and these adapters have their own wheel lugs the wheel bolts to. In a perfect world the adapter fits snug over the center hub of the car, while the wheel fits snug over the center hub on the adapter. I see a trip to a machine shop in my future, and possible a small bank loan! It's unlikely that this is an off the shelf item.

What if 1/2" is as far as I go and I install longer wheel studs and have billet spacers made so the center hub is snug on both ends? Would that do the job?

I know I should just look for different wheels but that would suck. I like these and there's no budget for new wheels.

[Dino]

We ended up posting at the same time alfa.

I never thought about the hub with these wheels. I have no clue if the wheel is snug around the hub or not but I will definitely find out and fix if not!

[Dino]

1" thick billet T6 aluminum with Mopar 71.5mm center hub. That's probably a good candidate for stock wheels but I'll have to measure the hub on my wheels first. Also if I do want to install the Mustang rotors I'd need a 70.5mm hub, but I could have the rotor hub enlarged. I'll measure the wheels and take it from there.

http://www.ebay.com/itm/4-1-0-Hubcentric-5x4-5-Wheel-Spacers-Adapters-Wheel-Centric-71-5mm-/221832552154?hash=item33a6401eda:g:nEQAAOSw4DJYkO8A&vxp=mtr

And these are just under 5/8" thick. I guess I have options after all!

http://www.ebay.com/itm/2-15mm-Hubcentric-5x4-5-Wheel-Spacers-Adapters-Wheel-Centric-71-5mm-/201787631327?hash=item2efb7ae6df:g:B9AAAOSw4DJYkOvO&vxp=mtr

[funknut]

There's a lot of Internet debate on this topic but I want to clarify a couple misconceptions.

http://www.gregsmithequipment.com/Hub-Centric-Vs-Lug-Centric

Lug-centric is a perfectly valid design and when the wheels are installed and torqued correctly, there are no shear loads on the wheel studs.  It used to be bad to mix hub-centric and lug-centric components because they were designed for their specific application, but these days when high strength hardware is everywhere, there should be no cause for concern.

In fact, with lug-centric wheels it is not required for the center bore to be the true center (it's not a necessary part of the lug-centric design).  This means that mounting a lug-centric wheel using the center bore may lead to an imbalance.  When balancing lug-centric wheels and tires, it's required to tighten the wheels using the lugs and not use the cone-type balancing systems that locate off the center bore.

In a hub-centric design, the hub determines how the wheels are centered on the axle flange or hub, so wheels are 'hub-centric' and are in constant contact with the hub.  The mounting holes and lugs for many wheels were not tapered like they are today, so a 'hub-centric' wheel was needed to ensure everything was aligned on center.  If a lug were to shake loose on a hub-centric design, no big deal because the hub is keeping the wheel centered.  Regardless, after the lugs are tightened, the hub should not have any shear load on it since the lugs, studs and wheel mounting surface are bearing 50,000+ lb of force.

Many factory wheels today (and nearly all aftermarket wheels) are 'lug-centric,' have a taper in the lug hole and require tapered lugs to make sure each wheel stud is centered.  This way, the wheels are centered on each stud, and therefore centered on the hub.  Once properly torqued, the tapered lugs also create a gap between the stud and the wheel, which also keeps the wheels from transferring any shear load to the studs.  Proper installation means torquing the lugs in the correct star pattern, first snugging the lugs and then tightening to spec.  This process ensures the tapered lugs can properly center the wheel on the studs.

A wheel bolts only job should be to hold the wheel tight to the hub. The load bearing should be on the spigot via a tight fitting wheel centre bore....there should be next to no weight putting side loads on the bolts. If you don't use hubcentric spacers then the bolts/lugs have high side loadings on them that they were not designed for.

See above, this is not true if the correct tapered lugs are used with lug-centric wheels.

Also the wheel don't tend to sit exactly central making wheel near impossible to feel balanced. This in turn will, over time loosen the bolts....not a great thing on the freeway!!! Even if you DONT use spacers but have aftermarket wheel with larger than stock centre bores you should use alloy or plastic spigot rings (cheap) to fill the gap between the wheel and the hub spigot.....dangerous not to.

In a lug-centric design, the lugs center the wheel on the studs, which does ensure the wheel is on center.

There are hundreds of millions of cars on the road today with lug-centric wheels and there's no increased incidence of lug-centric wheels with lugs backing off.

I run lug-centric wheels on 3 vehicles and 2 of those have lug-centric spacers and I sleep very well at night.

[Dino]

Looks like these MB wheels are lug centric then, The center hub is around 77mm.

So in essence, I should be ok mounting one of these spacers with the correct center hub size to fit the stock hubs? I would have to verify that they are 71.5mm on both ends and not just on the wheel end.

[alfaitalia]

Most modern wheels are lug and hubcentric. All cars in Euro have to be at least hubcentric...preferably both.
It's true about the large clamping forces involved...but there are equally massive shock loads put through them when you hit a bum. I'm in the caravan industry...at the moment most caravans only use lugcentric wheels but due time unacceptable wheel loss numbers there is big pressure to make them hubcentric as well.
At the end of the day do what you are happy with....it's great to have both (belt and braces as we say here).....of course in an idea World you should get the correct back spacing wheels and not use spacers at all!

[MoParJW]

My WV steelies are lug-centric, I had never seen it before on a passenger car in Europe, but from what I understand it is more common in the US?
I'd prefer hub centric wheels, but the lug-centric wheels seem to hold up fine.

I would think it is even more critical that the wheel mating surfaces are clean and free of grease.

[Dino]

My front wheels are 17x8 with 6mm offset which should convert to a backspacing of 4.74. The rears are 17x9.5 with 6mm offset which should be a backspacing of 5.5. I'm thinking a 1" spacer in the rear and 3/4" or 1" in the front should prevent the tire from rubbing and enhance the look nicely. I'd use the spacers I linked to, or something similar. I may have to cut my wheel studs to clear but that's easy enough to do.

Come to think of it, I probably should get disc brakes on the car first and see if that affects the position of the wheels.   

[Kern Dog]

Do your back tires hit that silly bump in the wheel well? I have 295-45-18s on a 10" wide wheel. My tires hit the bump on rough roads or if I have a fat passenger.

[Dino]

Do your back tires hit that silly bump in the wheel well? I have 295-45-18s on a 10" wide wheel. My tires hit the bump on rough roads or if I have a fat passenger.

No they actually hit the inner wheel well when I take a sharp turn onto a steep driveway which makes one wheel tuck into the well. Not a lot though, they have left a smooth mark in the undercoating without going all the way to the metal. No rubbing while on the road, even taking hard turns. Moving the wheels out will definitely help but the question is how much! My tires are only 275 wide though.

What are you doing running around with fat passengers?   

[Kern Dog]

I have a retired buddy that looks as if he swallowed a basketball. Another one is 5'7" and weighs almost 300 lbs. The tires don't rub when the wife rides along.

[Dino]

300? You can put him in the trunk and keep the car level when you jump a creek!   

[Kern Dog]

He is becoming the real life version of Uncle Buck.  I painted his 64 Valiant in 2015:

[Troy]

You forgot the important parts...

What is the offset on your current wheels? What size tires?

I could probably search but I'm busy. And lazy.

Troy

[Dino]

 No I didn't! Well ok I didn't mention the front tire size anywhere in this thread.

17x8 with 4.74" bs and 245/45 on the front and 17x9.5 with 5.5" bs and 275/50 on the rear.

The spacers I linked are hub centric but the 1" spacers are also available in lug centric. Once a rotor is on the rear axle, not much of the hub is left to use a hub centric spacer on me thinks. If I can use a hub centric specer then I should find a ring to fit the hub on the spacer and the center hole in the wheel which is around 77mm.

You forgot the important parts...

What is the offset on your current wheels? What size tires?

I could probably search but I'm busy. And lazy.

Troy

My front wheels are 17x8 with 6mm offset which should convert to a backspacing of 4.74. The rears are 17x9.5 with 6mm offset which should be a backspacing of 5.5. I'm thinking a 1" spacer in the rear and 3/4" or 1" in the front should prevent the tire from rubbing and enhance the look nicely. I'd use the spacers I linked to, or something similar. I may have to cut my wheel studs to clear but that's easy enough to do.

Come to think of it, I probably should get disc brakes on the car first and see if that affects the position of the wheels.   

[alfaitalia]

The spacers go on top of the rotors...not underneath. So you will  still have the full "hub" of the spacer to locate the wheels on...unless I'm not understanding you correctly.

[Dino]

It was probably me, I confuse myself all the time!   

When you put a rotor on the rear axle, the axle hub barely protrudes through the rotor. So when you place the spacer on top of that, it would likely have to be lug centric since there's not enough axle hub for the spacer to grab on to. The wheel then goes onto the spacer but because there's a 6 or so mm difference, I'd need one of those hub rings to fill that gap. Now that's all fine, but the wheels is lug centric as well and I'm not sure how precisely in the middle these wheel manufacturers make that center hole.

Am I making sense? Probably not.   

I'll try to explain the options with pictures, but not right now. Ive got a big exam tomorrow.   

[green69rt]

Just saw this thread.   IIRC the whole deal with spacing the wheel very far out on the spindle concerns the load that is carried by the two wheel bearings.    I think that the wheel should be centered over the inner wheel bearing, it's the biggest and was designed to carry the load.  The outer bearing is much smaller and is only meant to carry the load associated with keeping the wheel centered on the spindle, very little load carrying capacity (OK there is obviously some.)   If you space out the wheels/tires it shifts the center of the wheel towards the outer bearing and increases the load on it while taking load off the inner bearing.  Seems to be a formula for wheel bearing failure.  If you do this you need to make sure those puppies are thoroughly greased.  

Maybe I'm blowing hot air  

[Dino]

Yeah I thought about that. I'm not sure what to do with the whole thing. IF I install spacers I'm definitely not going over 1" and I'd want to check the spacers and bearings periodically.

This wouldn't be an issue if I could afford custom wheels.   

[alfaitalia]

I used to hear that all the time over on the Jeep forum..but some of those guys are using huge spacers to increase track or using wheels with next to no back spacing (same effect). So far there has been no real evidence that I have seen that the bearings of these vehicles are wearing any faster than the stockers......and the bearings in a lots of these Jeeps see a lot more abuse than any road car probably ever will.

[green69rt]

I used to hear that all the time over on the Jeep forum..but some of those guys are using huge spacers to increase track or using wheels with next to no back spacing (same effect). So far there has been no real evidence that I have seen that the bearings of these vehicles are wearing any faster than the stockers......and the bearings in a lots of these Jeeps see a lot more abuse than any road car probably ever will.

My info is really old and things do change.  Better materials, etc.  It also depends on how you use your vehicle.  It's more info to consider.  But, our cars are old designs so I would be thoughtful about how I changed the suspension from stock without considering the effects.

Oh, and my comments only apply to the front.  The rear axle bearing setup is a completely different animal unless you're running a rear independent suspension setup.  As for jeeps and other off road types, I'd like to see their spindle and bearing setups.  Just wondering....

[redgum78]

I used to hear that all the time over on the Jeep forum..but some of those guys are using huge spacers to increase track or using wheels with next to no back spacing (same effect). So far there has been no real evidence that I have seen that the bearings of these vehicles are wearing any faster than the stockers......and the bearings in a lots of these Jeeps see a lot more abuse than any road car probably ever will.

My info is really old and things do change.  Better materials, etc.  It also depends on how you use your vehicle.  It's more info to consider.  But, our cars are old designs so I would be thoughtful about how I changed the suspension from stock without considering the effects.

Oh, and my comments only apply to the front.  The rear axle bearing setup is a completely different animal unless you're running a rear independent suspension setup.  As for jeeps and other off road types, I'd like to see their spindle and bearing setups.  Just wondering....

I think a couple of things come into play here regarding the fronts. The way I understand tapered roller bearings is as follows;
They have to work in pairs which is why they are ideal for both radial and axial loads (front wheels). They also share the load between the 2 bearing sets proportionally but not necessarily evenly. If the load is mainly centred over the larger inner bearing it will carry a higher % of the weight but a proportion of it will still be passed onto the outer bearing. As the location of the load moves outward the outer bearing will take additional weight but probably not as much as we think unless the wheels are massively offset. Also most bearing sets are over engineered by a fair margin which allows them to perform ok outside of their design range with out failing. IMO the bearings will be ok. They may last 50,000m instead of 80,000m which is no big deal. If it were mine I would Just check them more regularly.

[Draco]

  Dino, do you know for sure that you need a 1in spacer for the front for caliper clearance or is it just what you want for preferance? Mine are 13in rotors with 18x9's on front with 5in BS and wheel and tire fit well. But not sure how 17in rims clear.

[Dino]

I'm sure I can get away with a thinner spacer but I would like the wheels out a bit more. That said, if 1/2" clears the calipers and it's a better idea than the 1" spacer then I'll go with that. I can live with the front wheels where they are so any movement outwards is a bonus. I have the same wheels as Ryan C. and if you look in invincibleextremes' thread you can see he had to grind quite a bit of material off the calipers in order to clear the spokes. I think a spacer will make it an easy bolt on. I wish I could fit some Brembo calipers on the 13" rotor though as they have a lower profile. Lots of Brembo's for sale on ebay off of different cars.

The rears I'd like as close to the quarters as possible but I'll make 1" the max I'll go with a spacer.