LEXisJaDeM

iTrader: (12)

So 5,000 miles after lowering my car, I had to finally replace my tires because of camber wear on the inside of my rear wheels. When I lowered the car, I had it immediately aligned and had the toe adjusted. Guess the shop didnt know what they were doing, so I had another shop recently do an alignment and toe adjustment to see if they can fix the issue.

I plan on putting on some wheel spacers to bring out my wheels, but I dont want it to affect my camber. Now my question is, if my tires seem to be wearing out evenly now, will adding 20mm spacers affect the camber wear? A few people that I have spoke to have said that widening the stance will affect the camber issue. This does make sense, but can anyone else confirm this? Thanks in advanced.

mex lex

iTrader: (4)

Based on what I hear on other people's experiences, spacers will add a bit of negative camber tire wear. How much, I can't say though. I just got spacers all around on my GS but I don't know what effect they will have on tire wear. I would get it aligned again just to make sure and have no worries.

mikez

I dont understand how spacer will put more negative camber... all spacer does is push the wheels out in the same plane as your hub, the camber angle of your wheel's face will remain the same...



Look at the wheel at the right, all the spacer does is move the wheel physically to the right more.... it doesn't change the slant of the wheel.

Unless I am incorrect

LEXisJaDeM

iTrader: (12)

I definitely can agree with you on that. My first thoughts were that adding spacers won't affect the camber. But I can see how others believe it can affect it. I've heard from others that by pushing out the wheels, it creates more weight in the center causing negative camber.

mikez

Oh thats true, I didnt think about that haha.

lobuxracer

iTrader: (2)

No, it won't change the camber angle. It can't. It will change a bunch of other stuff, but not camber.

LEXisJaDeM

iTrader: (12)

but what bunch of other stuff will it change? my concerns are having to cough up more money on things like new tires and alignments. especially when i decide to upgrade on wheels, tires are gonna be a pain in my wallet.

lobuxracer

iTrader: (2)

Scrub radius, roll center, roll axis, wheel stud loading, and wheel bearing loading will all change with spacers unless you are using a spacer to compensate for a wheel with the wrong offset.

If you're adding the spacers for cosmetic reasons and don't drive hard, these issues won't likely affect you dramatically for quite awhile. If you do drive your car hard, you may be buying wheel bearings, studs, and tires sooner than you'd expect. The thicker the spacers the sooner you'll be replacing stuff.

LEXisJaDeM

iTrader: (12)

Great information, definitely going to consider those factors. Thanks!

mikez

What is the difference between wheel spacers that has built in studs, compared with low offset wheels?

lobuxracer

iTrader: (2)

Less stress on the studs. Everything else is still compromised if the low offset wheel's centerline is not in the same plane as the centerline of the wheel bearing when looking at the tire tread. Scrub radius refers to how far off center the tire's contact patch is from the point of rotation when the wheels are turned. This is essentially the same problem just manifested different ways.

mikez

I see, so you're basically saying if people use low offset to go flush, the wheel better be wide enough, that answers it thanks

lobuxracer

iTrader: (2)

No, I'm saying if the wheel's centerline doesn't coincide with the bearing's centerline you've still got a compromised system. Width has nothing to do with it. Offset is unaffected by width because the offset is in relation to the wheel's centerline. So if the system was designed with a 50mm offset, any wheel will need a 50mm offset to align correctly with the bearing. Anything else is going to side load the bearing and change the scrub radius. There is no escaping it.

mikez

Wait... I dont know what the bearing's center line is....

But a narrow wheel (m) with high offset means the center line of the wheel is behind the back of the hub's face with a distance (x)... now if you use a wider wheel (n) with lower offset couldn't you technically still get the x amount of distance of the wheel's center line behind the hub's face... but now its more flush (n-x) front distance? Since the x distance of the wheel's center line to hub's face is same as before, then its align with the bearing? I'm confused lol

Sorry for all the questions BTW, better to understand things than to have misconceptions about it

lobuxracer

iTrader: (2)

Pic below is from a site discussing vintage cars, but the principles are the same. Note the difference by changing the rolling diameter of the tire in the example - scrub radius is changed and bearing loading is changed. The same things happen when the offset is determined for cosmetic reasons without regard for the engineering done to ensure the bearing load remains even. Keep in mind, all Lexus cars use double row angular contact ball bearings. They do not use tapered rollers. I have no idea why they do this as tapered rollers have a much longer service life under heavier loads, but Toyota has been doing this for years (certainly since the MkIV Supra). Before you cry foul, we have double wishbone suspension not struts, remember the principles are the same regardless how you articulate the suspension. Double wishbones do a lot of good things for you, but they can't overcome bearing side loading issues any more than a Mac Strut can. So there's a lot more at work than just making it look pretty with choosing an offset. You're moving up the death sentence on your wheel bearings as well. If yours is a show car, no big deal, it will never see enough mileage for a serious problem to develop. If it's a daily driver, you might go quite awhile, but if you drive hard or track your car, you can expect your wheel bearings will not last terribly long. For example - One Lap Supra racers have either replaced their rear wheel bearings before One Lap, or they've had to replace them during One Lap because they fail. It happened to Andi Baritchi and to Greg Caloudas. Both cars were well prepared, but the rear wheel bearings on a MkIV Supra aren't that great to begin with, and given the stress of One Lap, they will fail prematurely compared to normal use. I don't know anyone who has gone over 100k miles on them, and most guys running tight offsets expect them to be a frequently replaced item.