Wheel Spacer Help

KevinV

Member
Jan 9, 2001
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Hello,

I'm having a bit of a wheel spacer problem. I've had this car for about a year. I got it with the wheels, tires and wheel spacers already on it. Lately I have been noticing some rotational clicking noise when driving. A shop told me the wheel spacers are causing the lug nuts to work loose. They suggested checking and/or tightening them every 500 miles or so.

I don't know the reasons why it has wheel spacers. It looks like an attempt to both push the wheels out to the fender edges and to correct for wheels with the wrong backspacing. I included some pictures below. The front has a 1/4 generic style spacer. The rear is a 1 1/4 spacer which has bolt extensions (whatever these type are called). I don't know if the front or the rear or both are working loose. It has the 5 lug conversion as you can see. I don't know how that was done. Could the large spacer in the rear be caused by the 5 lug conversion? I don't know if the same axle tubes are used for those conversions.

I'm looking for what my options are to stop the lugs from loosening up. I've read about hub centric and specific fit spacers. For the fronts, I can get one that is less generic but the hub centric kind doesn't look like it will work. There's no place for the inset to fit into. As for the rear, I don't know. Obviously new wheels and tires is also an option. I do like these wheels and the look.

If anyone has any suggestions, that would be appreciated. Also if you happen to know what kind of wheels these are, that might help also.

Thanks,
Kevin

20170806_101148.jpg 20170806_102154.jpg 20170806_103921.jpg 20170806_103929.jpg
 
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Those are torque thrust wheels....factory mustang gt wheels.

Figure it like this... Sn95 mustangs are 3/4 inch wider each side hub to hub than a fox. I would think you would only need a 3/4 spacer to bring the rear out to where the factory wheel would have been.

Your wheels look to stick out a little too far in the rear.

These are what you need...
Screenshot_2017-08-07-20-27-02.png
Screenshot_2017-08-07-20-27-13.png



The problem is your wheel wheels want to fall off...no seriously. The lug nuts don't keep the wheel on....that metal circle they sit on takes the weight of the car.

The spacers are on the front because without them the little round dust cap would pop the center cap out of the wheel.

That was a cheap 5 lug conversion. If you swapped the front to 94-95 spindles and brakes you wouldn't need that front spacer. 96- 04 front spindles and brakes would work too but you'd have to use offset rack bushings to raise the steering rack and use a bump steer kit.

Edit; you wouldn't have to change the steering rack position but you would need a bump steer kit because the litter tie rods would be way out of geometry without them.
 
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You can run those wheels without any spacers. SN95 17x8s will clear perfectly fine on the 5-lug drum setup and SVO front rotors...they just look a tad bit sucked in.

I would definitely NOT run a slip on spacer up front. The rear ones lack the center hub to take the load of the wheel. I wouldn't run them either.

If you take all the spacers off, the wheels will look sucked in. Perfectly drivable though. I had some old photos of my car with 17x8s, and when I had 5-lug drums, they sat way in. Just no center cap up front.

If you do want to run spacers, run a 3/4" (20mm) hubcentric bolt on spacer with a hub lip for the rim to sit on. Then you'll need to size hub rings to fit the rim. Up front 1/4" spacer is max I'd run. Unfortunately, that thin is slip on only, so skip front spacers.

Btw, those wheels are 03-04 Mustang GT wheels. The front conversion is 84-86 SVO rotors (stock caliper) and the rear is ranger axles/drums.


If you want perfect fit with those rims without spacers, you want 94-95 spindles, and 94-98 SN95 axles/disks out back. Perfect fit with SN95 17x8s and no spacers or rub
IMG_2618.jpg
 
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The front wheels won't work on that set up without the spacer unless you remove the center caps, but mustang5l5 is correct.

I just went through this last month on a buddies 92 with the same wheels and 5 lug swap.

1/4 inch spacers are fine... I run 1/2 inch hub centric spacers on the front of my car with longer studs ( moroso ) and 8mm spacers in the rear. I have an IRS swap and 94 spindles up front with 50mm offset 2013 18 inch wheels.

With 1/4 inch spacers up front you have plenty of thread left on the wheel nut studs and there is still enough of the center lip left to securely center the wheel. The back is unsafe.

You could remove the rear spacers. The wheels will look sucked in but they won't be about to fall off. Or....order the spacers I posted and have wheels that fit and stay on.

Bolt on hub centric spacers are allowed in the racing rule book. They are safe with correct design and installation. Race cars put more stress on the wheels than any street car.

This is what your car will look like with no spacers in the rear ( this is the car I worked on last month )
IMG_20170416_100544281.jpg
 
Thanks everyone for the help on this. I'm going to get the new rear hub centric spacer and see how that goes. I may look into some of the other things mentioned in the future, the SN95 hardware and such.
 
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