I have been hearing alot of folks talk about the wheel spacers that you can buy to get a wider stance or to remedy larger tire clearance issues. I was out playing around with some different size tires today and accidentally put a front stock wheel backwards. I noticed it because the rotation arrow was pointing backwards, anyway, I also noticed that there is a significant inward offset on the front stock wheels. Why not just have the front tires mounted backwards and mount the wheel inside out? This would be a significant width difference and wouldn't require the addition of something else that could fail or come loose. Just a thought?!

 

This is widely done by the sports minded poeple. It is known that added stress is put upon the spindles, but still done by many racers. Or racers buy aftermarket offset rims wich are about the same price as wheel spacers. Once again the offset rims put added stress on the spindles.
I run flipped front rims with no problems. Out of the 24+ thousand members I have yet to see a post of spindle failure due to flipped front rims.

 

I am certain of the extra stress, but gaff, in your opinion, or anyone else out there, would it create more stress than a $70 wheel spacer? I know that I would have stress if I paid $70 and found out all I had to do was to turn my wheels inside out!

 

ConMan-- I got a 2" wider stance, going with ITP "C" series wheels. They cost $75/ea. That is 2" TOTAL gain in width. Frt. and rears are offset POS. 1".

 

I flipped my rims on my 400EX 6 months ago and havn't had any problems with it. You need to pick up an extra set of valve stems to put on the opposite side of the rim. The original valve stem needs to be flipped over to point into the tire or else it will hit the brake cylinder. There are other ways to plug the hole, but this seems to be the simplest. You should gain about 5 or 6 inches of width in the front by doing this. I also bought an extended axle and between that and the flipped rims the stability of the machine is greatly improved. Good luck yankin' on the valve stems!

 

Here is my thoughts conman.

If I put wheel spacers, offset rims or flip the wheels, isn't that all going to have the same results. Isn't all three ways going to move the center of your tire out further from the spindle bearings. So whats the difference?

I read and listen on the forums more than I ever post. When I was going threw the same problem of this decission every one told me about potential problems. Then I went to the track and found that either every one had there tires flipped waiting on costly a-arms, or they had thier tires flipped for so long that they hadn't had any problems yet so why dish out all the cash for what they have now. But where ever I go or what ever I read I have yet to hier of spindle failure due to this.

I'm not saying that there couldn't be a problem in the future, I'm just saying the three different ways that thier is to move the tires out have all the same results as far as spindle stress.

I personally have mine flipped and added 3 1/2" to my front. I race alot and abuse my front end alot, just never had any problems yet.

On a side note thow, alot of quads run into the problem of the brake callipers cut the valve stems off when you flip them. What the rest of us have done is drill a hole on the other side of the rim and added a valve stem. At the same time taking the original valve stem out and putting it back in the original hole backwards (facing in). Remember to glue your valve stem caps on, because the valve alone won't hold air.

I have absolutely no air loss in my tires with this set up. Think about it, I take on 40 to 80 foot table tops, I don't believe you will be stressing yours as bad as we stress ours.

 

A couple weeks ago I flipped the front wheels on my mojave as well as my brother warrior. We have been beating the **** out of them with no problems yet. I was able to find a set of very short valve stems at the local auto parts store and the short stems cleared the break cylinders on both machines. This cheap mod made my mojave 5-6 inchyes wider in front and it rides like a different machine now. I can't wait to get an extended axle to match the front.

 

I agree 3tv, I'm not in the market for width. Just an observation for those that might be. I just wanted to save someone a buck or two if I could. I know that the posts here have certainly saved me a ton of money talking about the pro's and con's of one mod or another. I had to give something back.

 

On a 400EX I've yet to see any spindle issues from flipping the front wheels (or any of the other "cheap" width methods).

However, we have personally folded an upper control arm when landing a jump with flipped wheels, also have a much higher occurance of bent tie rods.

Those aren't the real issues though.

The real issue is handling. Anytime you move the tire/wheel centerline out from the imaginary line running thru the ball joints, you put more stress on one of the most important components of all - your arms.

Think about how leverage works.

With this additional "feedback" coming thru the bars, you will become fatigued faster and more suseptible to injury.

Ride two quads thru a particularly rough section - one with flipped wheels, one without - you will notice a very substantial controllability difference between the two - you will be much faster, less fatigued, and have less arm pump on the quad without flipped wheels.

In the utility world, this may not make as much difference as it does in the Sport world.

This is because usually on utilities, you're increasing tire size which minimizes the problem. In the Sport world, it becomes worse because you are typically reducing tire size.

This is because the point that matters - is where the imaginary line going thru the ball joints hits the ground in relationship to the center of the tire. With the angles being what they are, with bigger tires, that point is further out than what it is with shorter tires.

BTW, there is basically no difference in the stresses added by wheel spacers vs reversing the wheels. The only correct way to add width is with the use of longer control arms.

 

I don't know about 4x4 but I know with my mojave the flipped front wheels made the rough sections more stable and easier to ride. One of the trails that we ride is an old railroad bed. It is about 2 miles long and it is increadibly(sp) rough, the flipped front wheel on my mojave (as well as my brothers warrior) allow us to go faster as well as keep control of the quads more easily. The conering characteristics of the mojave are greatly improved as well. It does not feel like it is going to roll over while taking sharp corners at speed. Overall flipping the front wheels may not be the right way to widen the front end of a quad, but so far it has worked well for me, although I wish that I could afford longer a-arms.