wheel spacers

[gti265]

hello all,

i have 17inch standard gti wheels, would putting spacers on help with handling atall,

and make it look a bit better (not that it looks bad to begin with) but move the wheels out to the edge of the wheel arches a bit?

also wheres the best place to get them, and are there any specific brands people recomend?? and would i need new wheel bolts??

thanks
tom

[monte]

They will look better with the spacers, but you are probably better off saving the money and getting some 18" wheels and tyres. 

I don't know if spacers will make the car perform any better, but 18" wheels/tyres will improve the handling and you could keep the 17's for winter use.

Not sure about the costs of adding spacers, but you will need to buy spacers, longer bolts and longer locking bolts. The £££'s will start adding up quickly.  Might be an idea, just doing the rear spacers like Pete (rdfcpete) Send him a "PM".

See his thread here (page3).... 

http://www.mk5golfgti.co.uk/forum/index.php/topic,15910.30.html

[RedRobin]

.
It's very important you buy Hubcentric spacers.

Just spacers won't properly improve your handling. Anti-roll bars would be a better mod. Then there's other suspension options but it's a slippery slope!

[POC]

I'm running 15mm Rear spacers and 10mm fronts with std 17in wheels.  Some pics on here:

http://www.mk5golfgti.co.uk/forum/index.php/topic,20250.0.html

Hubcentric spacers made by TPi, think they were £120 for the four inc the longer bolts.

Paul

[gti265]

cheers guys, yer i was thinking about new arbs and walk, but just thought id pick your brains about the spacers and see what you thought :)

[andrewparker]

I don't know if spacers will make the car perform any better, but 18" wheels/tyres will improve the handling

I'm not sure if I'd agree with that. Sure if you're swapping your 17" Monzas for a lightweight 18" wheel it will improve steering feel, but if you're comparing 17" Monzas with 18" Monzas then in my experience you loose a bit of sharpness. With 17" Monzas my car felt a little keener to turn-in, and just that little bit livelier.

I currently have Forge spacers on my car and the quality is very good. I wouldn't go looking for the cheapest brand either - quality really does count in that area.

[candy turbo]

spacers are cosmetic only , from a performance point of view they are crap because so many brake , if you do have to have some get quality ones like H&R


not good !!!!!!!

[DaveyCupra]

Like the pics above get good ones like eibach, H&R etc. I got FK ones and they ended up like the ones in the pic whilst I was fitting them to the car 

[monte]

I don't know if spacers will make the car perform any better, but 18" wheels/tyres will improve the handling

I'm not sure if I'd agree with that. Sure if you're swapping your 17" Monzas for a lightweight 18" wheel it will improve steering feel, but if you're comparing 17" Monzas with 18" Monzas then in my experience you loose a bit of sharpness. With 17" Monzas my car felt a little keener to turn-in, and just that little bit livelier.

I currently have Forge spacers on my car and the quality is very good. I wouldn't go looking for the cheapest brand either - quality really does count in that area.

  I stand corrected    For some reason I just expected the 17" monza's/tyres to be less stable through the corners due to the bigger profile tyres. Thinking about it now I realise that 40/45 profile are not that different. 

To the OP though, I would still get a set of 18" lightweight alloy with a better offset. This would give you better handling, and fill the arches better.