Wheel Spacers - Pros/Cons?

[Geoarch]

I Know using a wheel spacer is a pretty common thing, but is there any potential detriment to your vehicle long term? I mean, I'm no engineer, but widening the points at which thousands of pounds are supported makes me cornered that the added stress is going to be on another critical piece of the vehicle somewhere.

I ask because I really want to look at some different wheels for my Mojave, but the factory backspacing makes finding replacements kind of tricky. Wheel spacers would give me a lot more options.

On my Rubicon I got zero offset. This brings the wheel out more for some situations. I believe the Rubican OEM offset is in the +40s, which puts in inboard quite a bit.

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[piroman683]

Very well put and easy to understand with respect to X/Y axis and stress. I can see how the stresses on the studs may be greater with the spacer now. An OEM wheel with spacer and aftermarket equivalent backspaced wheel ie 3.5-4.5 should both have equal additional stresses on bearings, balljoints, u joints and other axle components though right? Also- the stud failures that I have seen/read about are on the spacer side, and have not actually seen the hub studs broken?

Thanks for taking the time to reply! ????

I’ve seen almost all stud failures on the spacer side, only seen them on axle when idiots torque things to 300+ ft./lbs.
The impact to other joints is negligible when comparing spacer to offset. The area of concern is the bolted joints of rim/spacer/axle.

 

[ezekio3160]

Last year I was looking at getting wheel spacers from my local tire shop and the technician said “we don’t do wheel spacers, you don’t want another point of possible failure” just sharing what I was told. So I bought off set wheels

 

[Phishs]

Wheel spacers are fine as long as you run the hub centric spacer and I buy forged aluminum. I’ve never had an issue, though I do check them after first 500 miles and then very oil change (5000 miles). I haven’t had any loose after over 20 years of running them on trail rigs to DDs.
I like the stock wheels and Quadratec does have copies with better offset and width (my spare is a stock copy wheel). I may eventually get those but for now the 2” spacer on stock aluminum Rubicon Wrangler rims looks great IMOP.

If you use the thread locker to install, is it still a good idea to check the lugs on the spacer? Wouldn't that break up the thread locker doing that?

 

[Elff]

I agree with your thinking and as such,
I always use thread locker on the nuts that hold the spacers to the hub, torque em to spec and do not touch them again, unless I remove them.

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