Wheel spacers, what to look for??

Marc07

Road Burner
Points
27
Location
UK - Bexley
Car
Audi A8 3.7 V8 40V
Hi guys
I am finding difficult to get the rims I want with the offset correct for my car so looks I will have to use some spacers.
What to look for??
Whats the difference between 10pounds 5mm spacers and 50pounds 5mm spacers etc ???

Thanks in advance ;)
 
Hi Marc!
General thought is lighter equals better.
If you gonna put spacers make shore they are hubcentric model. It means they got edge around center holle to support your wheels just like your wheel would be suported without spacer.
Do you need spacers for moving wheels further than stock or you just compensate for inapropriate wheel offset?
When you move them further than stock setting you change camber, your springs feel a littlebit softer and in my suspicion you change ackerman angles. Also car is more prone to bump steer and if your tire get empty precise steering could be compromised. It is related with "scrub center" and I'm sorry for my english is not good enough to at least try to explain it with technical terms.
Hope this post got you some more questions, because in right questions lies the answer.
 
Cheaper ones are not always very well balanced and they often come in a one size fits all stud patterns. You need your spaces to be rotationally balanced and light but they will also need to be strong.

It is an idea to get the suspension checked after fitting and just make sure all the alignment is spot on. You will 90% of the time be perfectly fine with 5mm spacers but it is a good idea to have all the suspension properly set up and can really improve cornering and handling.
 
personally, i will not use spacers, but if you are going to use them please check your wheel bolts are still adequately long enough! it sounds simple enough but so many people don't check...
 
You will need longer bolts if you use spacers that are bigger than 3mm. You will also need hubcentric spacers as well.

Don't forget you will need to work out the new offset before you purchase anything. The general rule that you get what you pay for applies as always.
 
Also I'd throw in that even with a change of wheels with no spacer you may still need to source longer bolts or a slightly different bolt head profile.

I know in my Manual there is a comment that new wheels from Audi need to be matched to bolts of the appropriate dimensions.
 
Guys, THANK YOU !!!
First of all I will focus on getting wright wheels, 20'' 9J 35-40 offset
Then I will get new bolts or nuts.
Spacers I will use only in the worst case scenario.
I have now 45offset.
For 9J recommended is 39 due to the air suspension. But I found source which says 35-45.
The wheels I found in UK with the right offset are nice, but...
The one in UK which I like very much are either 29 which is to much out, or 50 so there i will have to use 10-13mm spacers which I'm not keen on.
As per my original thread 'Alloys upgrade' I am starting to thinking back again about the ones from US/Canada. I found someone already in Canada, cousin of my work mate, who is keen on sending them to me as a Gift, can they pick on wheels as a Gift and ask me to pay duty which is 250quid+ ???
The one from us are exactly what I want, Hartmanns manufactured for Audi, 20'' 9J 40offest and 1500dollars seems to be not that much on the end of the day, but it all depends from the cost of getting them send to UK.
I really want to get it right with no spacers and wheels I want.
 
With an offset of ET40 I can't but think they will look lost in the arches still. To get it right you will want them flush with the body. But using spacers won't have any adverse effects (lots of people use them).

Have you looked at other A8s and what offsets they've used?
 
No, thats the thing, there is not many A8s D3 so you can just look at them like that :(
ET40 will take them 5mm out than what it is now.
ET35 would be ideal, but the set I'm thinking about back again comes with ET25 as well.
25 looks like at least 10mm to much from all the specs I've checked so far, I assume is all to do with the air suspension, which as I said I want to keep as it is more a family car so custom suspension is not the option at the minute.
There wont be a issue in Comfort mode, but the problem might be when its set to Dynamic where suspension is on the lowest setting therefore is they are to far out it will scratch the wheel arches.
If not that, I could get them from UK, exactly same ones, but ET29 and in gloss silver which I'm not the biggest fan of for this color of the car, and they are cheaper by 250quid, and no hassle with getting them to someone in Canada and them DHL to UK.
But the ones in UK have no clear branding, Hartmann is known and you have got some guarantee of quality.

http://hartmannwheels.com/wheels/hartmann-hs5-209-ga-m-replica-wheels-for-audi-fitment

Idea is, if I get rims with ET40 (the only one set with this specs is the one from US), I can always use the 5-10mm spacers as a worst case scenario.
If I get 25 or 29 offset, there wont be a way back to slightly higher offset.
But just know, I've checked once again the fitments for each model on that page (link above), and it says A8 V8 2003+ ET40 and ET25 for 20'' !?!?
Would they be aware of the suspension matter where it says all over the place ET35/39 - 45 for this car ????

This is the car and the rims from US
It looks like 25 offset, but same time looks like is on Comfort setting
D3_A8_S5_209_20_1.jpg


Now, this is the original S8 Wheel 20'' ET46 9J !!!
sungardbl2.jpg


And thats mine on 18'' (8.5J !!!) ET45
a8.jpg

A82.jpg


I understand that 9J will still be slightly more off to outside than 8.5J as is wider or...???

Thanks once again guys.
 
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The ET25 looks far better as it's sit flush with the body. If you got ET45 you would need 20mm spacers to achieve the same look.

The width doesn't determine how far it sticks out, the offset does. I've got 8J rims all round, yet the fronts are ET22 and rears are ET17. The rears poke out more because of the offset.

I would probably throw caution at the wind here and go with the ET25s above. You can always get arches rolled and flared if needed.

Alternatively you can an offset can be altered by a lathe. Meaning it will become higher. The ET17s I mentioned were ET10. But I had 7mm machined off.
 
Are they OK if it says 57.1-66.6 not 57.1-66.56 ??
I assume not everyone is measuring exactly to 1/100 of mm...
Untitled-2.jpg
 
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If not late, I found that calculator pretty accurate. You can see what hapens when you change ET, rim wide and diameter:
http://www.willtheyfit.com/

Cheers, yes that was the first one I found and used, but it's obvious and a common sense really that if you buy wider wheels with smaller offset they will come out more.
Then I used that one as well.
http://www.miata.net/garage/tirecalc.html

Both clearly show that overall diameter of the whole wheel wont change comparing 255/45/18 to 255/35/20. My problem was how, much smaller offset would work with the air suspension, thats it, I do not want to buy new wheels new tyres and on the first run cut/scratch all of the tyres on wheels arches.
But I found these very recently

wwwww.jpg


in 20'' 9J ET29 which is just between 25 (Hartmanns) and 35 (max in all other guides). Dont like the gloss silver, but we will see. 9J will give that a bit of extra stretch as now I have 8.5J so all together I should fit well within the arches even on a Dynamic setup.

Cheers once again

PS
Are those rings good quality (previous picture/thread) ???
 
Don't know about rings. Never need to use one so far. Know there are plastic and aluminium rings and that one on the pic looks like alu. Guess it is better than plastic one, but don't know why. :lol:
 
The spigots look decent enough and *should* be fine. Don't forget that colours can be changed (I know of somebody very good not to far from you). So if you bought them silver you could get them re-painted in something different.

What offset are the wheels you have atm?
 
The spigots look decent enough and *should* be fine. Don't forget that colours can be changed (I know of somebody very good not to far from you). So if you bought them silver you could get them re-painted in something different.

What offset are the wheels you have atm?

At the minute ET45 18'' 8.5J

The ones I'm looking for all 9J all of them.
The silver ones are ET29 9J.
 
At the minute ET45 18'' 8.5J

The ones I'm looking for all 9J all of them.
The silver ones are ET29 9J.

When you get 5 minutes grab yourself a tape measure, go outside and measure what gap you have from the wheel to the arch. It'll give you a rough idea of what space you have to play with.

The next issue will be clearance. The problem isn't normal driving, it's under hard cornering. Have your arches been rolled?

Prince, could you ask the guy how much would cost to respray them in gunmetal/anthracite gloss, please ;)

I'll PM you some contact details mate. ;)
 

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