Wheel spacers

[Punknoodle]

After much deliberation and planning I've decided on the fitment I'm going with for the SP1s I'm ordering soon. I don't want to go staggered offset or width, being a 4wd, although I am going staggered hub sizing to get more of a dish on the rear. I could do the same on the front but I'd rather leave some room for bigger brakes down the track.

With an 8.5" rim and 235 tire I'll be sitting pretty much flush on the front, but the gap on the back will remain ghastly. For some reason, Toyota pumped the rear guards on the widebody but kept rear track narrower than the front!

Now, the only option I have without going staggered offset is to run a spacer on the rear. I don't want to be stuck with staggered offset rims and a spacer is easily removable so it seems that a quality, hubcentric spacer is the perfect solution, and I'm pretty sure I'm going to get a set, it's just I've heard mixed opinions.

Obviously they are illegal here in Queensland, (I'm willing to bend that little rule, I know, I'm pretty bad ass) because I figure they are illegal because too many people were going with cheap, or mis-fitting spacers and having them fail, so a blanket ban went in place. However if I buy a quality spacer, fit it properly, I can't see how it can be dangerous. They are legal in many places from what I understand and even competition cars run them.

What are your thoughts?

 

[BrutherSuperior]

Spacers are fine so long as you use longer wheel studs/bolts. And that's the issue people have; using a standard length wheel stud and only using 2-3 threads on it is a recipe for disaster.

 

[mafia_boy]

Even though BrutherSuperior is right, people used to use standard length bolts in most cases, the flipside that you have to look at (and what the police look at) is that if your spacer fails, you will have a wheel fly off your car that can fly across into someone else's windscreen and kills them or a passenger or they spin out and wreck trying to avoid your flying wheel and/or failed spacer. You won't have a leg to stand on as you've already done something illegal and if someone died as a consequence of your spacer failing, you will have a lot bigger problems than just a defect punknoodle, like negligent driving causing death or even manslaughter.

Besides, I'd rather spend a couple of hundred more making sure I've got fully legal parts and the amount you'd spend getting the spacers would be the same couple of hundred extra that you would've spent getting the staggered offset rims.

 

[Keef]

Spacers are fine so long as you use longer wheel studs/bolts. And that's the issue people have; using a standard length wheel stud and only using 2-3 threads on it is a recipe for disaster.

Trudat.

If you're going to use standard studs you shouldn't use a spacer any thicker than 5mm. Over 10mm you'll be able to find spacers with studs already pressed in them so you don't have to take the knuckles off your car.

When you buy spacers the lug pattern and size are obvious, but you also should be wary of the hub diameter. You need to know your car's hub diameter because many spacers have different common options. Having the same diameter is ideal, but being bigger will work just fine.

EDIT: Apparently you already know about the hub. Well, I'm just here to say that if you can't seem to find a hubcentric set, a larger size will still work. It would be located by the lug nuts, no different than a non-hubcentric wheel.

Also consider painting them the same color as your wheel so they're not as obvious to whoever might be interested.

 

[nobuffalo]

Don't the ST205s have a wider track in the back, and aren't all those parts interchangable? Too expensive, too much work maybe? I could be wrong, but just throwing the idea out there.

This guy says it's 2 inches wider than the track of a camry all-trac, which is 56.7 according to www.toyotareference.com Treference states a 91 all-trac celica has a track of 56.9, so with the st205 bits you'd have a track of rougly 58.7...

Once again I could be looking at everything the wrong way.

 

[Punknoodle]

Hmm, it's not the price of the staggered rims, as the cost for the same size rim in say a +3 is the same, just I'd be stuck with that offset, could be beneficial to bring it back to near factory offset on occasion.

As for changing to St205 rear running gear, that is something I haven't thought of, I might investigate that option. I'm defiantly not trying to take the cheap and easy option, the amount I've spent on the car so far is sort of proof of that lol.

It's just I can't see that a quality item that is sold legally and marketed as being safe (just look at the H&R Trac+ website) can be so risky. I'd be going 25mm so it would come with it's own set of lugs pressed in. I was thinking of going with Wedsport items.

I'll contemplate my options a bit more though...

EDIT: Ok I've looked into staggered fitment rims, if I went with the same size rim but in a +5 offset rather than a +30 then obviously that will be the same as running a 25mm spacer and will give me 95mm of dish, with the standard disc option. Super low disc is not available in that offset unfortunately.

Same price, same size wheels and tires to keep the centre diff happy, just staggered offset. Downside is I wouldn't be able to revert to near standard offset if I needed to. And no wheel rotation, but that's no biggie it's just a trip down to the tire place.

Before I go down that track though, has anyone had any experience with dramatically changing the offset on the rear of the car, how did it effect handling? Obviously this would happen with these offset rims or running a spacer, but at least if it didn't handle any good I could simply remove the spacers... Any thoughts?