Expand Quote
Expand Quote
Picked up some radial slims and new bronsons and upon putting the spacers in one of the bearings will slide slightly out of the bearing seat. It's not enough to cause it to become loose but it's not flush (maybe like 1mm on 1 bearing) and I have been wondering if it'd be more beneficial to ditch the spacers or just use it like it is or even order some slimmer spacers?
My opinion on bearing spacers is that they are completely unnecessary in most, if not all modern wheels.
They were created when wheels were much softer, and were designed to help keep the bearing (and bearing seat) aligned perpendicularly with the axel.
Since most wheels now are a much harder duro, or have harder cores below the softer urethane, I have not once found them to be beneficial in any modern skateboarding situation.
They're beneficial anytime your wheel has lateral movement - powerslides, landing sideways, reverts, etc.
It distributes the torsional load across a larger surface as opposed to directly on the inner race. That load is what leads to the bearing cage breaking which is the cause of most bearing blowouts
also, not a super important metric, but spacers allow (require - to get any real benefit out of them, really) you to tighten down the axle nut more, which reduces that rattling sound of your bearings moving between the hangar and the axle nut.
my setup just feels more solid with spacers and tighter axle nuts.
like, when it hits the ground, it's more of a solid smack; not a smack with that reverberating loose wheel sound...