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The mkiv Supra Owners Club

plastic or metal spigot rings


jza800

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Guest pharmed

I use to always use plastic until I found the lip on them affected the fit of one particular set of wheels. Yes it was weird! (cheap rims most likely?!) anyway used alu since. Not that expensive on the bay

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Yes mate plastic is fine as has been said steel ones can rust up over time and then sometimes need a big rubber hammer to knock the wheel off so not good if on the side of the road with a flat tyre!!

But plastic or steel they both do the same job of taking up void space of centre bore as seats the alloy centrely on the hub it's still down to the wheel nuts to do the hard work and hold the alloy so no wait or strain on the rings at all

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they are only really used for locating the wheel not withstanding any force,

Yes mate plastic is fine as has been said steel ones can rust up over time and then sometimes need a big rubber hammer to knock the wheel off so not good if on the side of the road with a flat tyre!!

But plastic or steel they both do the same job of taking up void space of centre bore as seats the alloy centrely on the hub it's still down to the wheel nuts to do the hard work and hold the alloy so no wait or strain on the rings at all

 

:eek:

 

That's the opposite of what happens. The hub takes all the shear loading of the wheels, i.e. the 1600kg of the car's weight and all the forces imparted under shock loads, acceleration, braking, and cornering. All this will therefore go through the spigot rings. Are you sure you still want plastic?

 

The wheel nuts just provide a clamping force to keep the wheel on the hub, they don't get (and shouldn't be) subjected to shear forces.

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:eek:

 

That's the opposite of what happens. The hub takes all the shear loading of the wheels, i.e. the 1600kg of the car's weight and all the forces imparted under shock loads, acceleration, braking, and cornering. All this will therefore go through the spigot rings. Are you sure you still want plastic?

 

The wheel nuts just provide a clamping force to keep the wheel on the hub, they don't get (and shouldn't be) subjected to shear forces.

 

The hub to wheel clearance is not an interference fit. If the hub were to take all the load then the wheel would fret on the hub. The force of the wheel is transmitted to the hub via friction on the vertical plane and the nut and studs apply the sufficient clamping load for the friction to exist.

 

The spigot assists in centring the wheel when the nuts are torqued. The nuts ultimately centre the wheel.

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I've always though spigot rings aren't designed for load purposes and as far as I know it's a lip provided to locate the wheel so the wheel can be lined up correctly with the studs to ensure that they're centre, hence "hub centric"...

 

If the hub was supposed to bare all the weight then wouldn't the hub spigot extend to sit further inside the wheel bore?

 

I've used plastic and metal spigots, the only difference is quality from my experience.

 

Metal one's shouldn't need to be replaced and their shape will stay constant, whereas plastic ones can deteriorate over time.

 

I never had a problem with plastic spigot rings though.

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:eek:

 

That's the opposite of what happens. The hub takes all the shear loading of the wheels, i.e. the 1600kg of the car's weight and all the forces imparted under shock loads, acceleration, braking, and cornering. All this will therefore go through the spigot rings. Are you sure you still want plastic?

 

The wheel nuts just provide a clamping force to keep the wheel on the hub, they don't get (and shouldn't be) subjected to shear forces.

 

Hate to disagree Mr. C, but the loads are all reacted throught the friction joint between the wheel and the hub, not through the spigot ring. :) I ran with no spigot rings for the entire 9 years-plus that I owned my Supra without a hitch.

 

The time that the rings will see a load is if the the wheel studs somehow become loose. If that happens then the clamp load will relax and the sliding force that the joint can accomodate without slipping will be reduced. With no spigot ring in place to control the amount of eccentricity between the wheel and hub, the wheel will slip until the load is reacted through the wheel studs themselves, which isn't a nice way to do it. I don't think it would cause an instantaneous failure, and you would probably feel a good bit of vibration.

 

Of course they also locate the wheels during fitment, but I had conical wheel studs which do the same job.

 

If you are confident your wheels are always going to be proplerly located and will never come undone, the physics says you will be fine with plastic rings, or indeed no rings at all. If you want a safety net, use a ring. Plastic will be fine but if something does go wrong you will probably have to replace them. Metal would probably be a "fit and forget" solution.

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Hate to disagree Digsy :), I too ran with no spigot rings for the entire 9 years-plus with conical wheel studs without a hitch but I always had issues with wheel vibration over 100km/h as soon as I got the Aluminium spigots the vibration went and the front steering tightened up , more direct steering and faster direction change

 

If you need hub rings , like with most aftermarket wheels the Bore of the barrel does not match the OEM bore , get steel/Aluminium ;

 

From Mr Wilson

never use plastic or similar , plastic ones are NOT suitable. the wheel studs should work *ONLY* in tension and see no vertical shock loads at all. They will *NOT* centre the rim properly without them if the hole in the rim is bigger than the snout on the hub.

 

All shock loads should be taken through the hub's "snout", via the well fitting hole in the centre of the wheel.

Edited by Jellybean (see edit history)
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Hate to disagree Digsy :)....

 

Weeellll.... I won't dispute that you had problems, but as a simple joint design, the friction between the hub and the wheel when clamped by 5x M12x1.5 bolts tightened to 103Nm should be capable handling of a shock of just over 44kN without slipping. That's equivalent to accelerating one corner of the Supra (weighing 1500kg) upwards at nearly 12g. For comparison I just had a quick chat, with one of our suspension guys and he says that 4g is an "abuse" level. Granted, the pure vertical load case might not be the overall worst, but those numbers give me a lot of faith in the wheel to hub joint, spigot ring or not :)

 

Of course, as we both said, they help alignment and if your alignment is off wthout then adding a spigot ring will help or sure it, but make no mistake, they should not be taking any direct load unless the bolts come loose.

Edited by Digsy (see edit history)
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My personal opinion is that plastic should be fine unless you are planning on doing a lot of wheel swaps (which might wear the rings inner diameter), or you don't want to have to replace them if somehow your wheel studs come loose. But if there was little or no difference in price I'd probably get aluminium ones.

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Plastic only...spigot rings are not to transfer any friction/motion bla...bla....they are there to keep wheel in centre while tightening the nuts. Seen a lot of horrors with aluminium/steel spigot rings...

 

That makes no sense , if your wheel is machined to the correct bore of your car , it is centred by the wheels hub , which is metal

 

If you seen a lot of horrors with aluminium/steel spigot rings, something is seriously amiss with the wheel/nuts or incorrectly sized rings not matching your cars bore

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Anyone got a link to the correct metal (S/S or aluminium) spigot rings for use on a Supra (60.1mm) wearing rims with a 73.1mm centre bore?

 

I have plastic rings fitted at the moment and to be honest haven't had an trouble lamping the car into kerbs at the track but I've always intended on getting tougher items.

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The plastic won't crush or deflect even if the wheel wasn't on properly. But with a correctly done up wheel there's no load, that's what Digsy (the automotive engineer) has confirmed. By using plastic you avoid the metal on metal weathering. Basically I wouldn't change.

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