Anyone here use a wheel spacer? I like my stock wheels, it's just that I feel a little wider stance would make it look tougher. Like a 1" hub centric spacer. Thoughts?

 

When I used to install wheels/tires I used spacers. Nothing near that thick though. Maybe 3/8" or 1/2" spacers. I think something that thick would put too much stress on the lugs. You would be better off going with a leveling kit and 33" or 35" tires to get the wider look you are looking for.

 

This is the type of spacer I was looking at. It bols to your rotor with your stock lugs and then you wheel bolts to it with a seperate set of lugs. I am told that it doesn't place added stress on the lugs as it is hub-centric and most of the stress is transferred across the spindle. Not sure if that's true or not, but my dad has been running a similar set of these on his truck for a couple of years without any problems.

[IMG][/IMG]

 

Running spacers on anything over 4500 lbs is a bad idea. The stress is there no matter what kind of spacer you use. The farther away from the hub the wheel is, the more leverage is placed on the spacer wrt distance. It is not really the wgt., but the acceleration of wgt over a bump or pothole that kills ya. I would go with different tires/wheels.

 

I had some that 2" in the front and 2 1/2" in the rear on a 2001 Sport Trac and it really set it off and they worked great with no problems for a few years. But then I had a 2001 Navigator that I did a 1" spacer/adapter (5 to 6 lug) which was 2 pieces and everything was fine until one day I pulled up to a red light and some lady was like (in a queer eye type voice) "hey, I think your tire thingy is kind of loose" and I looked down from my window and sure enough, that sucker was wobbling like a sumbich. I pulled over and checked it , and it turns out one of the studs holding the two pieces together had snapped in two! If I had been driving down the highway at higher speeds, I'm pretty sure that I would have lost the whole damn tire/rim! These days I think I'll just stick to either changing wheels and tires or lifting my trucks.

 

+1

Not worth the risk of having catastrophic failure and taking out your truck (and maybe somebody else).

 

Like this?

 

Seeing that story about poor old Slappy pretty much sealed the deal for me. Spacers? um... no thanks.

 

Just one more place for a failure to occur due to overtightening (or loose lug nuts).

 

I'd stay away from ALL wheel spacers. .