Wheels / Tires: Eibach wheel spacers

[junior]

In my never ending (so far) quest to achieve a look for my car that I am happy with I ended up putting myself in the position of having to use wheel spacers. I decided that I needed to add 1 1/2" to the rear track. Now using wheel spacers is not exactly the newest, nor the best idea since sliced bread, but a guy has to do what a guy has to do. I sourced a set of Eibach 19mm Pro-wheel spacers because I felt they offered the best design for what I wanted. They are hub-centric, so they put the weight of the car on the 'hub' of the axles, not on the wheel studs, and that means the studs can to their job of transferring torque to the wheels, and keep the wheels clamped to the axle. The spacers are very high quality, and have such a tight hub tolerance that I had to sand away the surface rust on the axle to get them installed. I also had to shorten the factory studs, and re-chamfer them. They took forever to come from Germany, and weren't cheap either $189 cdn dollars. Now I 'just' need to machine 1.5mm deep pockets in my wheels to clear the lug nuts on the spacers...which brings up the fact that my planning for this whole rear axle swap could have been a lot better. I spent the whole day yesterday installing them, and then temporarily bolted on my wheels, put the car back on the ground ... had a gander...oh ya baby, that improved the look a whole lot! Happy camper indeed! Please refrain from telling me that this is no good for the rear bearings, axles, etc, etc...'cause I know, I know, I know...but I also know that this design meets some rather strict German standards, and the application is for S-Blazers, and they even make a 40mm spacer of the same design for the same application. (figure I'll be okay for a croozin-street driven Stude) The more I try and stay out of trouble, the more trouble I get into. Cheers, Junior


Nov. 17...'machined' some pockets into the backs of the wheels with a router of all things. Needed to go 1.5 mm in depth to clear the lug nuts, but went to 2.1 mm (about 80 thou. of an inch) to allow for expansion of the metals because the wheel was at -11 C when I cut the pockets.

[Jerry Forrester]

Looks good Junior. A man's gotta do what a man's gotta do.
What size wheels and tires are you running on the rear?
Hows about a pic of the car with the wheels on. Just the rear quarter at a slight angle.

[Mike Van Veghten]

Do note, while your spacer "is" centered on the axle, your wheels will not be. They will be held up only by the studs.
While this...as you say...has been done for years, and many if not most aftermarket wheels have a large center hole, don't put too much power to the rear wheels..
Just make sure the studs are of a good grade, or replace with an ARP or something similar.

Mike

[junior]

Looks good Junior. A man's gotta do what a man's gotta do.
What size wheels and tires are you running on the rear?
Hows about a pic of the car with the wheels on. Just the rear quarter at a slight angle.

Sorry no photos...yet. Hopefully I'll get the car back together, and at least outside of the garage for photos soon. Winter is here now, with fair amount of snow, and lotsa salt on the roads so the Stude will not be going out for a test drive anytime soon. The rear wheels are modern day Astro-Supremes...made by Unique. 15 x 7, 3.5 back space, 255-60-15 rubber. I tried 15 x 8's with 3.625 back space and no spacers but the tires would have been rubbing the fenders on corners...too bad they didn't make the 8 inchers with 4 inch back space...oh well. cheers, junior.

[junior]

Do note, while your spacer "is" centered on the axle, your wheels will not be. They will be held up only by the studs.
While this...as you say...has been done for years, and many if not most aftermarket wheels have a large center hole, don't put too much power to the rear wheels..
Just make sure the studs are of a good grade, or replace with an ARP or something similar.

Mike

Correct Mike, the wheels do put the spacer studs in shear, and are only centered buy the conical lug nuts but that is the exact same way they were mounted on the axles without the spacers so nothing was lost or gained in that respect. I would not have gone with these spacers if they were centered on the axle by the lug nuts alone. I have put my faith in Eibach that the spacer studs are quality items...these spacers are not cheap junk. cheers, Junior

[sweetolbob]

Correct Mike, the wheels do put the spacer studs in shear, and are only centered buy the conical lug nuts but that is the exact same way they were mounted on the axles without the spacers so nothing was lost or gained in that respect. I would not have gone with these spacers if they were centered on the axle by the lug nuts alone. I have put my faith in Eibach that the spacer studs are quality items...these spacers are not cheap junk. cheers, Junior

Junior

First off, two excellent posts. If indeed the issue is not centering off the axle, let me suggest that it's a simple machine shop turning to match the ID of the spacer as there is a shoulder available with the concentric ID of the wheel. It would yield an adapter with a step and center the rim to the axle. Most custom wheels have a lip inside the center hole that could be used to hold the adapter in position. Otherwise it wouldn't be difficult to adapt another way to hold the adapter in place.

The studs, as described above will carry the load.

Thanks again, Bob

[junior]

thanks bob, that`s an idea I didn`t think of, and if need be, the lathe I have access to at school could perform this function. don`t know how many other`s can use the info from this post, but one just never knows...the reason I posted was to inform folks of a company to go with if they wanted some quality spacers. I usually equate Eibach to springs and sway bars. regards, Junior.

[junior]

bumping...the job is finished as the I cut pockets into the back of the wheels to clear the spacer's lug nuts. added some photos.

[rodnutrandy]

I ran spacers on a 440 6pk. 70 Cuda and beat it to death and had no trouble. I did always hear that you don't want them on front wheels. Here is picture of my Cuda with Chevy rims on rear .

[t walgamuth]

I ran spacers on my autocross cars for years, including some rather thick ones as used above. I never had any trouble with the spacers even though running flat out starting and stopping with sticky 1.4G hoosier slicks.

Enjoy!

[junior]

I ran spacers on a 440 6pk. 70 Cuda and beat it to death and had no trouble. I did always hear that you don't want them on front wheels. Here is picture of my Cuda with Chevy rims on rear .

betcha that was a wild ride...betcha wished you owned that car today. junior

[junior]

I ran spacers on my autocross cars for years, including some rather thick ones as used above. I never had any trouble with the spacers even though running flat out starting and stopping with sticky 1.4G hoosier slicks.

Enjoy!

what did you autocross? the photo in your avatar looks like an old formula ford, or vee/super vee. what is it?

[t walgamuth]

what did you autocross? the photo in your avatar looks like an old formula ford, or vee/super vee. what is it?

That is my current weapon of choice. Its an 85 Reynard FF 1600. It has a 1.6 pinto motor making 110 hp and weighs about 900#. With the low autocross gears I am told will do 0 - 60 in about 4 seconds. Before that I ran a 99 MIata sport for a couple of years in CS, and before that an 84 Mercedes 280e euro in ESP. Before that I ran an 84 Mercedes 500 SEC. Autocrossing is the most fun you can have in a car with your clothes on....IMHO.