Hi,
I have seen something called wheelspacers on ebay. They are not expensive and sell for around £10-£15.
I dont really know what they do :)
Do you place them behind you alloy wheel , before you refit the alloy. Are the designed to giv the car a "wide wheels" look?
I think they would make a car look awesome with a proper wide stance if thats what they supposed to do
Has any of you used them? Are they safe?
cheers
Mike
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You would need longer wheel studs or bolts for a start.
Yes, gives the illusion of wider wheels , from the outside anyway.
IIRC the RAC banned them from competiton use many moons ago due to various mechanical failures.
--
I wasna fu but just had plenty.
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They ruin steering geometry, and hence steering feel, they reduce the thread engagement of the wheel nuts, sometimes dangerously, they can impose a higher load on the wheel bearings, reducing their life.
Truly awesome!
Number_Cruncher
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Yeah. but they potentially take a car off the road whos owner thinks that a wide look and random loud stainless twinpipe backbox are cool - a result :-)
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You fit them between the wheels and the hubs.
They
Increase the load on the wheel bearings,
Increase the load on the wheel retaining bolts,
Increase the load on the steering gear,
Increase the load on suspension components,
Change the airflow over the brakes,
Will rub the wheel arches under certain steering angle/suspension movement combinations .
Are they usefull? Yes, you can see how much tread you have scrubbed off the outside of the tyre without turning the wheel.
Are they safe? Probably, up to 10mph in a car park in a straight line.
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A common use for spacers is to enable the fitting of wheels with an incorrect offset for the vehicle you want to fit them to.
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Component part is right. But the spacers can cause wheel arch fouling on full lock, excess wheel wobble and invalidation of Insurance as you probable did not tell them you have change the alloys. Regards Peter
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I was thinking of applying them to the rear of the car when I purchase a set of nice alloy wheels.
My car has got brake drums at the back
I was going to leave the front wheels standard so my car will look like its got a wide low back side!
Surely this wont affect sterringand braking etc if its on the back should it?
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And if you have a BL Mini and fit them to the rear only you will have an over-steering front wheel drive car. This was a big (and dangerous) learning exercise. Just don't ask why I tried it.
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i have a front wheel drive polo 1.4 r reg.
Will it mess the handling up.
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Nothing will improve an R-reg Polo!
Spend the money on a Saxo or C2 if you want a cool look
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To answer the question, there's good and bad spacers, the bad are pressed metal plate with huge multi fitment holes in them, the good are known as "hubcentric" and are machined from solid material specifically for a particular fitment.
They will cause tramlining, wheel bearing wear, bumpsteer, arch clearance problems etc
Buy your wheels first.
Post an ebay link for us to look / laugh at ;-)
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here you got mate
(Sorry, link had to be removed because it was too long and messed yp the format. HJ)
ebay link
what you think?
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From behind they make you look like a saddo who can't afford the wheels you really want.
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are 19mm wheel spacers going to make a big differnce on the apperance?
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Rubbish mate, leave them where they are, the universal gives the game away. 19mm will almost certainly give arch trouble with alloys of a reasonable width.
If you must have any look for H&R hubcentric 4 X 100mm fitting, but buy your wheels first ;-)
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.................. make a boring car exciting because you never know when a wheel is going to fall off!
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When I had my Mini and Anglia with Spacers, they caused me no problems with tyre wear or wheel bearings. They improved road holding etc and improved air flow over the brakes.
The main thing with minis was not to have the track too wide against the wheelbase then it would become unstable at high speed and you must fit arches to cover the tyres.
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why cant you have tyres that slightly stick out of the arches?
is it illegal?
will it look stupid?
whats the max size spacers you guys think will look good?
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as has been said but i will repeat in case you missed it................
your insurance will be voided if you fit wheel spacers on a road going car........if you tell them they will either cancel your insurance forthwith or tell you to get an engineers report..........
been there many many years ago
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I suppose VW didn't spend a fortune on R & D, designing roadholding, comfort, aesthetics!
I know, let's stick some spacers on.
Save your money. Fit the wheels on back-to-front.
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Amongst other things, they increase the leverage on your steering so:
Braking hard, left front tyre finds a little more grip than right front. As there's more leverage on the steering, you sway a little more ot the left than you would have otheraise. Then the right wheel finds some grip and you swerve right. Thus, your carefully designed car snakes as it brakes.
This is my paraphrasing from a note in a mIni tuning book from years ago.
V
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You can probably fit 'nice alloys' that are slightly wider than standard Polo wheels anyway, but without the excessive offset created by spacers. They would give the more road-hugging look you're after, front and rear. Best forget about spacers!
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You can probably fit 'nice alloys' that are slightly wider than standard Polo wheels anyway, but without the excessive offset created by spacers. They would give the more road-hugging look you're after, front and rear. Best forget about spacers!
This is the soundest advice you will get here handsome. Wheels cost more but they're real and won't cause secondary problems. Forget spacers.
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They signifcantly help my bank account !!!!!!!!!
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