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Where Do I Find Wheel Spacers

3K views 6 replies 4 participants last post by  dant98 
#1 ·
As most of you know, I bought my new wheels like last summer. I like the look and all, but I do have one small problem...

I have 225/50/R17's on them right now. They are 17 X 7 wheels with a +40mm offset. My problem is, if I turn the wheel really hard, the side of the tire rubs on the front subframe just slightly. It's not a huge problem because you aren't normally going very fast when you make that sharp a turn, so not much fiction there, but I don't want to damage my sidewalls all the same. Plus, next time I get tires, I think I wanna go with 235/45/R17, which may put the side of that tire even closer to the subframe.

So I think I could just put some kind of spacer between the wheel and the wheel up that would essencially change my offset to I don't rub anymore.Any thoughts? The wheels I have are the Fox Sport 2's that are on clearence on Tirerack. They Fox 2's are also available in +42mm Offset, but they're not on clearence and are almost $100 more per wheel. I think Venum probably has some tip for me, if he's checkin' this forum...


-Dan
 
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#3 ·
Small spacers won't hurt anything; I've been running a set for two years now, no problems. Only gets bad if you try to add three inches out and fill a 30 mm gap.


Try contacting the manufacturer of your wheels to see if they made any kits for wheel spacing, or check their website for adapter kits you can buy seperate.
 
#4 ·
As he said, as long as they are a thin spacer, you will not have any troubles. I had 5mm spacers on my last set of 18's because the offset was 45mm.

I bought mine from a place I found on eBay. Here is their email address: Massey1946@aol.com


On a side note, you have the ideal offset for the wheels so the tires must be the real problem. You might try a more narrow tire when it comes time for replacement.

Hope this helps.
 
#5 ·
Originally posted by SHO 2NV@Feb 9 2004, 06:00 PM
As he said, as long as they are a thin spacer, you will not have any troubles. I had 5mm spacers on my last set of 18's because the offset was 45mm.

I bought mine from a place I found on eBay. Here is their email address: Massey1946@aol.com


On a side note, you have the ideal offset for the wheels so the tires must be the real problem. You might try a more narrow tire when it comes time for replacement.

Hope this helps.
225 tires shouldn't be a problem I don't think. I'm almost sure there are Gen 3's rolling here that have 235's. I wanna go to a wider tire, not a narrower tire... Wider is better
... Maybe a shorter tire?

-Dan
 
#6 ·
I went ahead and bought wheel spacers from the person you reccomended on eBay. Pretty painless. She (I think it's a she) created an auction for me listing the part and then sent me a link to the auction. I hit "buy it now" for like $12.99 and 6 bucks shipping and I'm in business. I got the 5mm spacers. She reccomended them to me. The 3mm may have not been enough and anything larger would have been bad. I'm not how mow much difference 1/2 a cm can really make, but we'll see. Next time I buy tires, I might go with 235/45 17 rather then 225/50/17. This should make the wheel a little shorter.. I think it adds up to almost 10mm difference.

Wheel diameter = 431.8 mm (17inches)

225/50/r17 : tire thickness = 112.5mm. Total outer diameter ~ 656.8mm or 25.86 inches

235/45/R17 : tire thickness = 105.75mm. Total outer diamerter ~ 643.3mm or 25.33 inches

So I guess it only gives me about 53/100ths of an inch... or about 1/2 an inch. more like 1/4 inch from the subframe cause 1/2 inch to the diameter, so 1/4 inch to the radius.

-Dan
 
#7 ·
Ah ha! I know what my problem is now!

The wheels I bought are actually +50mm offset rather then +40mm I think. The one's listed for my car on Tire Rack now... the $75 closeout ones are +50mm offset and the $175 are +40mm offset... Same wheel, wrong offset. This is why I'm having wheel rub! That should mean the spacer should give me 45mm offset which should fit better. I might even end up returning them for a 10mm spacer. The great thing is, I can probably replace the old rims with new rims one at a time if I want. It'll look the same for the most part, but I'll just have wheels with two different offsets till I replace them all. If I replace them at all. Though once I'm in the $175 range, I may as well look at 18's too, or at least 17X7.5 or 17 X 8 if they have them.

-Dan
 
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