Vintage speed tire question

[Brad Rose]

I received my vintage speed tires today and have a question. I'm running the Azusa aluminum wheels on the rear of the kart with 11x4.5x5. I have one inch spacers for the rear. Do I really need to use the spacers or not. If I remember correctly Steve Welte told me that he cut his spacers down to about 7/8 of an inch. Any recommendations?

Brad

[Nils gustafson]

Brad; tire performs well at 3.5"to 4.5 " inside bead meas. that's the sweet spot , I've seen narrower and wider also..
have fun ,gus.

[Brad Rose]

Thanks Gus! I'll just start at 3 1/2 and see what they look like. Tires look great by the way! I'm really pleased with them. Thanks!

[Jim Waltz]

Brad,

I'm assuming you are using Azusa Tri Stars, with Azusa spacers.

I think I heed to go to slightly wider rear tires on my first edition of the Kalifornia Nyke, but I haver never worked with those spacers.

Could you post a picture or two when you put the spacers to use?

In particular, I'd like to see how the wheel halves go together with the spacers, and how they fit onto the axle with the spacers in place.

I'm completely ignorant on this and trying to understand how the spacers work.

Ciao!

[Brad Rose]

Hello Jim! Yes these wheels are the azusa 5 inch live axle wheels. I will try to explain how I plan on putting the spacers in. First you will see that there are two alignment pins on the inside of the outer half of the wheel.here is a picture. My fingers are pointing at them.

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Second you will see two recessed spots on the inside of the inner half of the wheel. These all have to mate up for the two halves to fit together. The second picture shows the recessed areas.

[Brad Rose]

So is what I did was placed my spacer over the bolts with the outer half of the wheel and marked on the inside of the spacer with a sharpie where the pins were. Then I took my chainsaw file and filed two notches in the spacer to clear the pins so the spacer would lay flat. Picture 3 shows this.

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I hope this helps you and whomever decides to use these wheels. Take note I'm not a veteran karter so hopefully we'll get more info after this post from some of the veterans.
Also Gus at vintage speed said the sweet spot for the 11x4.5x5 is 3 1/2 to 4 1/2 inches in width.

[Brad Rose]

Here is another. Also the spacer will need to be drilled for the valve stems as you can see. And as you add spacers it moves the inside of the tire toward the frame.

[ted johnson]

Brad, remember that in order to prevent tube chafing, you should fill the left over half hole in the inner half of the wheel. I just did this this week on my CT wheels with the Will Rogers' spacers. I carefully aligned the two spacers, face to face, and drilled the hole right on the joint between the spacers so you get a perfect half hole in each spacer. I filled the left-over half holes in the inner wheel halves with JB Weld after making dams of thin aluminum and waxed paper, and carefully roughing the surface around each half hole, and the inner surface of the half hole, then I cleaned the surfaces with carb/brake cleaner. My patches came out great, and are hard as a rock. You almost can't see them after paint. Ted

[Brad Rose]

Great info Ted! Thanks!

Seems like someone posted that they applied tape on the inside of the wheel over the spacer seem to prevent chaffing also. Another good tip!

[ted johnson]

I don't use the tape, I just make sure the O.D. of the spacer matches the wheel diameter where they intersect, and that there are no sharp edges to cut the tube, and no openings for the tube to bulge into. I also put a very small chamfer on the exit hole for the valve stem. A little talcum powder on the wheel can really reduce any chafing through friction. I remember when I was little, and Pop and Grandpop had their Sunoco station. They always applied talcum to a new tire tube when mounting tires. I've carried that tradition for the years following. Ted