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I know that it has been mentioned a few times, but I haven't found any solid evidence regarding this situation.
Some people have reported replacing bearings 3 times in as little as 18 months when running spacers and other people reporting no problems having used offset wheels and/or spacers on multiple vehicles.
I currently have 15 inch 7J with a negative 3 offset wheels lying at home waiting to be fitted, but I have some concerns.
Firstly, I use the vehicle everyday and cover a fair amount of mileage, so I'm scared that this will wear the bearing prematurely (being quite expensive I don't feel like changing them once a year).
Some say that failure is more due to driving in a lot of mud and water.
Secondly, the car is still under service plan and warranty, I'm afraid installing these may void various parts of the warranty (i.e. ball joints, possibly some drivetrain components).
Looking at this from a static mechanical perspective, the original wheel has a positive 5mm offset whereas these are negative 3mm, therefore the load is 8mm further away. Not much. However in a heavy cornering situation, the wheel itself is wider and is further away so I think the load could be increased significantly.
I haven't done any serious calculations about this and maybe I'm just being paranoid.
Basically what I would like to know from the fellow forum members is if anyone has been running offset wheels or spacers for say 160000km or 100000miles without issues. This may seem like a high number, but I have friends with Pajeros with 400000km on the clock still with the original bearings and I never changed them on any of my road going cars.
8mm is very little spacers are at least 30mm and a lot of wear is from water mud and road salt! also mud tyres are very heavy compared to road tyres so this compounds the problem
Butta wrote: 8mm is very little spacers are at least 30mm and a lot of wear is from water mud and road salt! also mud tyres are very heavy compared to road tyres so this compounds the problem
Yeah, keeping in mind the original wheels are 5.5J though
I took a picture looking down from above the wheel arch with just the 7J wheel fitted (no tyre) and it would seem where the tyre is now with the standard stuff is where the rim is, so the tyre itself may not be much further out the car (should be 26mm further out on the tyre)
Yep the width of the rim makes no difference to how far the tyre sticks out (if the same tyre is used) only the offset 8mm difference in offset means 8mm further out tyre
I took my one inch spaces off and improved my bearing life considerably
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Martin
2003 M13 early KAP build.
3" Trailmaster lift with 1.5 Spacers on front
Customised winch bumper and roll cage
235/85R16 Maxxis Bighorns on 16" Rims, 4:1 Rocklobster, Rear ARB locker and on-board air
Corrected arms all-round, rear disks, Recaro seats and harnesses
