Wheel spacers for 98 Alfa Spider ?

[sportyone]

Hi,

Where to get Wheel Spacers for 98 Alfa Spider,

anybody had any experience with wheel spacers, the good type with the locating collet etc ?

Like size recommendations for front & rear etc.

thanks

[Steve S]

Are they legal?

[sportyone]

I believe so if they are properly fitted flanged ones, or if not, I have seen plenty out there with them.

Guess if you don't grab the attention of the police,

most would not know if the car didn't have a wider stance from new, IMO ?

[jazig.k]

They're not legal to my knowledge. I know people who have been defected for them and the car has been deemed to dangerous to drive. Had to get it trailered or remove the spacers to drive the car home.

Don't use them if they are not hub centric. It's an argument to google, but why bother risking it? Just use hub centric to eliminate that 'if'.

If you know what you're after for sizes, I do have a program to knock them out at work. I just made a couple sets [not for driving on, just for figuring out what offset works and how wide I can get under the car without scrubbing. But they would be more than suitable for driving on]. Made from 431SS,  heavy. 



(Bring on the 9" 245's! haha)

[jazig.k]

One last thing to think about is the length of your studs and how many threads the nut holds on by. 12 threads is the minimum legal limit I believe?
I use wheel bolts not studs, so I just get longer bolts to suit the wheels/spacers etc. but that's not standard on a 75. Not sure about a spider.

[colcol]

Just remember this, that wheels are located with spigots on the hub, to centralise the wheel, they are not located by the fasteners, the fasteners job is to clamp the wheel to the hub.
Spacers will not locate the wheel properly and will suffer from concentricity problems.
The taper on the fastener is not to locate the wheel on the hub, but to add friction to the fastener to wheel, so that the fastener won't loosen off.
When the vibration from the poorly located wheel causes the fastener to loosen off of worse, breaks and your car ends up on its lid, explain to your insurance company why they should pay you out, when you did something like fit wheel spacers, Colin.

[Garibaldi]

Col, great information as usual but which tyres should he use?

[colcol]

Tyres that are round and black and are not fitted with any spacers, Colin.

[alfamisa]

Tyres that are round and black and are not fitted with any spacers, Colin.

First and third I agree, but it's a matter of opinion, not always black;









                                   

[colcol]

Apparantly making colored tyres are not as easy as it seems, they were going to use them in Formula 1 a few years ago to show what tyres they are running, eg normal, soft and super soft.
They now use the different colored sidewalls to indicate the type of tyre being raced on, maybe Bernies cut was too great to make them economically viable.
Didn't know they still made tyres in Italy, good to see they do.
I need to get onboard with all the latest tyre developments and stop using Dunlop G8 crossplies, Colin.

[jazig.k]

Back on topic...

I don't agree that wheel spacers do not centralise wheels correctly. Cheap ones maybe. Why? Because I've made my spacers hub-centric. To what tolerance is the question! I've made my spigot diameter +.05mm (.002" for the old fashioned guys). For comparison sake, I measured a beard hair the other day. That measured .14mm.

A flat spacer will not locate the wheel. Let's not argue wether the clamping of the nuts and friction surface between hub and wheel is enough to bear the weight of a car and shock loads...

Find me the concentric tolerances for wheels and tyres. American aftermarket steel wheels are true within .030" for one brand I was looking at just 2weeks ago!
I'm willing to bet very few tyre mounted will be running true within 1mm.
I'd be also willing to bet the tolerance for most after market wheel hub holes would be -0 +.1 or more as I've had some sets fit the spigot nice and tight and others slop on there. Momo's actually seem to have an interference fit (made undersized to locate better?).

I don't believe that hub-centric spacers will not align the wheel well within acceptable tolerance.  In my case, accumulated error only adds up to a few hundreds of a mm depending on the wheels hub tolerance. Hard to believe half of a beard hair would cause a problem when the tyre would be running out more anyway.

I do believe the nuts are only to clamp, not to true the wheel. The angle of the seat is to increase surface area the nut is tightened on to stop the nut working loose (more area, more friction). Don't use flat spacers.

Still, they are illegal here in Australia.

[colcol]

They are illegal in Australia and it will affect your insurance, in case you hit a rolls Royce.
Why are you fitting wheel spacers anyway?, have you fitted wider tyres and they are hitting the suspension, you could get some different rim offsets, but that would effect the handling on turns, as the tyre footprint would be not quite in the correct position, Colin.