I had 7mm spacers front and 15mm spacers back installed at the weekend. Initial impression is that the car feels a lot different on the road - steering feels less direct and Im getting vibration through the steering wheel in addition to the car veering slightly to the left. It definately affects the feel of the car. I guess the vibration could be solved by getting the tracking / balancing checked out. As for the change in feel/steering maybe I just need to adapt. I had not appreciated that I would notice any difference save for the wheels filling the arches.

Does anyone else that tried spacers experience something similar? Any solutions?

Yes. Took them off.

I have the 5mm factory-installed spacers, and have no problems - not sure if that's necessarily an indictment of non-factory installations - I'm sure there's lots of ways to do spacers of different widths correctly, but you car should never behave that way. It should be easy to drive, not pull or drift to any extent. And there should be virtually no vibrations.

brad

There can be other factors at play here as well such as improper wheel bolt torque, out of round spacers and wheels that need balancing. While I'm not a fan of huge spacers I think it would pay to check all the measurements. You don't want to put your rotors at risk.

I have 5's up front and 16's out back. Not sure what the difference on the track is, but here is my experience.

Before I put them on there was a routine right-hand bend I would hit everytime I went to my office. I would take it at around 95 to 96 mph because of a dip in the bend - 3/4 of the way through. When I hit the dip, the car would come out of it and slide the the left a bit. It was controllable, but noticeable.

After the spacers, I could take the same corner at over 100, the car hit's the dip and stays on track.

It was so noticeable, I took them off one day, took the ride and put them back on.

Kind of ironic, because I'm sure the overall handling is not as good, but I haven't had it on the track for real testing.

Hey Brad,

If you don't mind me asking, I'm curious why you opted for the spacers. Was your goal cosmetic or performance related?

Thanks,

Mike

I threw a 15 mm spacer on each of my rears, and while it looks very nice, there is no noticable difference in handling.

( i have another pair of 15 mm w/bolts if anyone is interested)

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Cayman S Black.
s550
e93 m3 (in production)

Pure cosmetic was my intention - if it helped a little with the handling, then fine and dandy...

brad

well, i thought i was the only one. i've had installed spacers in both the front and the back wheels (required to get the Techart Wheels in) and i noticed about the vibration too.

i've had it for almost half a year now, and i havent got it aligned. can this be the problem?

another thing that i felt is that the steering now feels more numb compared to before installing the wheels and spacers.

is it because of the wheels' size (20") or is it because of the spacers that has not been aligned ?

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Techart Formula 20", H&R springs, Capristo Exhaust System, Techart Cayman GT kit, Brembo GT brakes

Hi. I've searched the threads on spacers and this is the closest thing I've found to my issue. I recently put Boothe spacers on my CS. 6mm on the front, 10mm on the back, the appropriate longer bolts etc. I have 19" wheels. I even had the Porsche dealer install them to avoid screwing anything up, under-torquing or over-torquing etc.

My girlfriend picked up the car for me from the dealer, and immediately reported to me that the car was pulling to the left. I drove it later that night and it did pull to the left a little, but on changing road surfaces it was neutrally aligned or even pulled to the right, so I chalked it up to coincidence or bad road surface.

Last weekend, however, I went on a (very fun) PCA run here in PA. Lots of curves, car seemed to do fine. But on a couple of short straightaways, I hit just over 100mph and I'm pretty sure I felt a significant amount of vibration through the steering wheel that I have not felt before.

Can anyone weigh in on thoughts here?? My spacers are good quality, they were (I would assume) correctly installed, they are not excessively big, tire pressures were normal (if a bit high due to lots of driving), nothing else that I'm aware of that was an obvious problem.

I'm really uncomfortable with the vibration I felt, and while I'm not often going that fast, it certainly isn't a "rare" thing either. I love the wider stance the spacers give the car and would *really* hate to have to take them off.

Any thoughts are appreciated. Many thanks in advance.

Jawad

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Current: '07 Audi A4 2.0T (black), '07 Cayman S, Basalt Black Metallic/tan, 6spd, SptChrono, NAV, 19" SportDesign, OEM SS, painted rear ctr console, 6-10mm wheel spacers, GW500 iPod integration. (Next: New exhaust. Which one???)
Former: '84 Ferrari 308 GTSi (black), '86 Alfa Romeo Spider (red), '97 Mitsu Eclipse GTS (red)

I bought the 10mm Rear Spacers/Bolts and locks from Ralph Boothe. I left the fronts alone as I felt they looked fine. I haven't noticed any difference. I was originally going to do 5mm front and 15mm rear and now after reading the above posts, I'm glad I didn't. IMHO the 10mm rears are perfect! Love the chrome bolts with matching locks too!

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I have the 5mm factory spacers which I installed myself. I haven't had any problems . . . no vibrations . . . the car does not pull one way or the other.

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Porsche Cayman 2.7
Mercedes E320 Bluetec
Ducati Paul Smart LE
BMW R1200GS