Anyone Here Run Wheel Spacers?

Superperv23 · September 8, 2011

A friend of mine has a 2007 gmt900 sierra and is putting on a 3in body lift and wants to keep the stock 17in wheels. I told him it will likely look stupid lifted with the tires that far under the body because of the stock offset. Anyway he doesn't want to buy new wheels and to get them out near the fenders you would have to go with 1.5" spacers so the kind with new studs in them. Just wondering if anyone has any experience with these or smaller ones that use the existing studs.

If you are just going to write he will die in a firey crash if he uses them please make sure you have a pic of a firey crash caused by wheel spacers and not just what you heard from your second cusins hairdressers best friend.

stlavsa · September 8, 2011

Ive had them for 50k miles. There are tons of people that run them.

Get 2" spacers from www.fatbobsgarage.com

Good stuff and best prices.

Stevens03 · September 8, 2011

I ran them on an S10 for a couple years without issue. The kind that come with the new studs are better than the kind without.

tyhuck · September 8, 2011

I ran them on an S10 for a couple years without issue. The kind that come with the new studs are better than the kind without.

X2. I ran them on the back of my S10 ZR2 with no issues. I never have run them on the front, but seems like it would be no different than a negative offset wheel. Just be careful. Sometimes the spacer can cause ballance issues. If you get some noticable vibration after installing them, install the spacer on your wheels and then ballance the tire/wheel/spacer combination. Then mark the spacer and wheel so you can install them on the truck in the same position. Even if the aluminum was cut on a precision milling machine, sometimes you get inconcistencies in the metal that may throw the ballance of a few ounces. Its not critical, but it will smooth out your ride if you get a bounce after installing the spacers.

I also thought about running spacers on my factory wheels, but I got a set of black steelies for just a little more than the cost of the spacers, and I didnt have to worry about painting my old wheels.

jnpaddison · September 8, 2011

http://www.gm-trucks.com/forums/index.php?...l=wheel+spacers

wavery · September 8, 2011

The stock offset is designed to put the load in the center of the wheel bearing. If you move that offset you will change the load balance on the wheel bearing and shorten the bearing life.

Is it significant? ........ You'll find that out over time. It's one of those "Risk/reward" issues. Leaving the stock offset with a lifted truck will put the balance of the vehicle off also, so there may be even a higher risk there. It may be worthwhile to risk the wheel bearings over risking moving the center of balance higher and not compensating that with widening the footprint. It's really not a "Looks" issue....... It's a safety issue as well.

Whenever one decides to change the original design of the vehicle, there are risks. One just has to weigh the risks and decide whether it's worth it and hope that you are smarter than the designers at GM.

tyhuck · September 8, 2011

But you also have to concider how many people have been changing stuff like wheels and lift height, but have had no issues. Also concider that when you change the factory setting, you will wear parts faster, but the amount of change will determine how fast those parts will wear out. Slight changes may not dictate a noticable loss in longevity, but large amounts of change such as large wheels with crazy offsets with lifts in the double didgets on stock drive components are definately gonna show signs of wear at an extremely accelerated rate.

wavery · September 8, 2011

I can guaranty you that when you change the load on a wheel bearing to be off center, that bearing will fail prematurely. Trust me....... GM sells a lot of front wheel bearing assemblies on the trucks. I'd venture to say that over 50% of those are from using off-set wheels or spacers.

Having said that, I still think that if someone lifts their truck, they need to do something to offset that lift of the truck will be off balance. Not a safe way to be. The bearing assemblies are cheap and easy to replace....... rolling your truck...... not so much .

cdb95z28 · September 9, 2011

Spacers get a bad rap. Buy high quality, wheel/hub centric, CNC billet machined. You can buy the smaller thickness ones, but make sure your lug nuts will still have sufficient thread engagement. If you have to go with longer studs, and I'm not sure if anyone has them available, ARP was always my choice. Make sure hub and wheel are clean/flat and free of corrosion. Tighten with a accurate torque wrench! Can't believe Summit and Jegs still sell those terrible cast aluminum one size fits all spacers. I had spacers on this:

Well over 300 hard road racing track miles with lotsa street miles too, alot of F-Body (among others) guys use them, no failures.

One thing that I would watch is if you are in a winter climate, I'd keep an eye on them 'cause of the corrosion due to the road salt.

-Chad

wigglewamm · September 9, 2011

so after talking to my second cousins hairdressers best friend i was told that if he keeps his stock offset and put on 10" wide wheels he will get the look he was wanting and no risk to the wheel bearings.

wavery · September 9, 2011

To keep some perspective here....

If the average truck wheel bearing lasts .....say...... 250K miles. Off-setting the the center of load on the bearing may shorten the life of the bearing by 25-50% (depending on the extremity of the off-set).

One (or more) owner making the comment that they have done it without issue often leaves out the word "yet". In reality, the original owner will probably never have an issue in the time that they own the vehicle. It's just a mechanical fact that at some point, the bearing will fail if not used as designed.

tyhuck · September 9, 2011

so after talking to my second cousins hairdressers best friend i was told that if he keeps his stock offset and put on 10" wide wheels he will get the look he was wanting and no risk to the wheel bearings.

Maybe, but then you end up with clearance issues on the inside of the wheel well, and could get rubbing on the A-arms, torsion bars, or even the frame.

Edit: when the wheels are turned, that is.

stlavsa · September 9, 2011

so after talking to my second cousins hairdressers best friend i was told that if he keeps his stock offset and put on 10" wide wheels he will get the look he was wanting and no risk to the wheel bearings.

I doubt your goin to find a set of wheels with the stock offset that are 10"s wide. WHen you start buying wider wheels that stock, the offset decreases further and further. Common offset for a 10" wheel is -22 and say you get into a 12" wheel your looking at -44, etc. The net effect on the wheel bearing is the same as a wider, negative offset wheel.