Rajaie Ghibih

Hey guys, first post here and I would just like to share my experience trying to figure out a set of spacers that work on the front hub of the W211 E55.

Little video I made trying to explain the problem I had with 5mm slip ons that ended up being a slight oversight since I thought the entire hub was 66.56mm... but it isn't!

Strigoi

Interesting. I'm not a fan of spacers and would never run them on one of my vehicles.

Rajaie Ghibih

Not too big of a fan either, but i've had good experiences with my other cars using H&R hub centric but this car as this weird bearing-hub set up...

And I was only going to run temporarily until new rims with proper offset come in. If anyone knows of spacers that work PROPERLY with the W211 front hub please let me know! 12mm preferably.

tlambert

Yuille36

I ran spacers on my BMW 525i, probably the biggest mistake I ever made. I mean it work out great for the wheels, I was using but when it came time to remove them.
I literally caught hell getting them off for a brake rotor replacement, the dealership used lubricating penetrates, heat and hammering to get them off.
My lesson, buy wheels with the proper offset.

Rajaie Ghibih

My problem is not with the rear.... it's with the front because of the elongated hub. If you watched the video it shows how the hub ever so slightly tapers down, I can't imagine anything but a thin plastic ring solution working for the front of the E55.
Since it's like 1/2mm to 1mm of a gap you couldn't even fit a lipped spacer on there and still maintain 66.56 center bore i don't think... unless they make spacers with lips that are literally less than 1mm thick. I've already looked through H&R and
there is one DR series that *LOOKS* like it might work, compensating for that taper and maintaining a 66.56 on the spacer lip but I was trying to get some definitive feedback before dropping 150$ on something I'm not sure even fits! It's not your
typical hub on the E55 in the front and it doesn't seem even H&R specifies the application.

tlambert

I understand it’s the front. Just giving you an idea of what might work. Give them a call and explain the situation. Hopefully they may be able to help you out.

Rajaie Ghibih

For sure gonna call em up, i'm pretty certain there is a proper fitting for spacer for the fronts considering this car is pretty popular and they've had over 14 years to come up with a solution to this front hub thing. Will post my findings here!

Rajaie Ghibih

So the E55 is not listed on H&R's application list. Neither is the E550. I'm going to go out on a limb and assume the E500-E550-E55-E63 all share the same front wheel bearing/hub style. Especially since the E500 and E63 share the exact same spacers on the H&R application list.

https://www.ecstuning.com/b-h-and-r-...pair/24556659/

24556659 is the H&R part number for 12mm FRONT ONLY spacers for the E63/E500

Remove the 9 at the end of that part number and u get 2455665 which is the REAR ONLY spacers for the E63/E500.

This is the same part listed for the E500 and E63. Like i said on the H&R websites application list there is no E55 or E550 listed.

I don't know why they can't just list the E55 so I don't have to sit here second guessing myself lol.

I guess at this point I just need to confirm that the E63/E500 share the same front wheel bearing/hub style as the one in my original post's video, and if they do that would mean that H&R part number 24556659 is what I would need for a proper hub-centric 12mm front spacer for my E55.

turabaka

These are the wheel spacers that you would need for the front hubs on an E55. They're exactly the ones I'm using on mine.

https://www.ebay.com/itm/15mm-5x112-...0AAOSwdjdaDWwx

Rajaie Ghibih

Thanks for the response Turabaka. No vibrations or anything at highway speeds with those? With my 20x10 et35 I would need to find 12mm. I honestly don't even need spacers but the damn hub doesn't fit in the rim bore.
Might just get the little lip that the center cap clips to bored out so I don't have to use spacers. (Rotiform IND-T 20x10 ET35 Square set, 255 front 275 rear). But thank you for confirming that those work on the E55!

turabaka

No vibrations at all. I'm running a spacer on the front, and back just for my winter wheels. The car has pretty wide aftermarket fenders, and I didn't want to run stupid wide snow tires, so I ran a stock sized wheel with spacers.

Rajaie Ghibih

Awesome! Thanks everyone for your input! Such a tricky looking hub lol. Car will be finished up soon enough i'm sure you guys will see more of it on here!

Mr._Hamilton

Hey I’m running into the same problems that the OP had with finding spacers for the front. The link you posted has expired but I just wanted to know if you could give me the name of the brand or eBay sellers name to see if I can track down a set for myself. Thanks in advance.

Rajaie Ghibih

The spacers I found were made by H&R, can't find the part number for em though :/.

Mr._Hamilton

ok thanks that puts me in the right direction.

Stuart McIntyre

Mr Hamilton,

Did you manage to find spacers? I am having the same problem.

s.i.f.i.

I have run spacers on other cars with no issues. So when I picked this e55 up and saw that it had spacers, required for the brabus monoblocks it csme to me with, I wasn't worried. But there were road vibes that came and went, brake wobble on occasion, look here look there, what's the problem. The only thing that seemed to help was going to 160 ftlbs on the wheel bolts, which reduced but did not solve the issues. Well one day with wheels off doing something else to the car i glanced at a spacer and saw bolt thread imprints into the sides of the holes in the spacers where the bolts go through. Fffffuuuuuuuu.... that means **** moved more than half a bolt diameter. I don't care if that was l9ng wheel bolts bending, or spacers rotating. Either one is... alarming. So now the car has sl55 wheels and standard bolts and all the issues are gone. I'll never put spacers on this car again.. might have been ok if I just boulevard-cruised... but no, this car gets driven. No wheels moving around and falling off plz ok thx!

Mr._Hamilton

yea, had to run non hub-centric spacers as every hub-centric set would give me the same issues we all were facing.

Andres Morejon

With the non-hubcentric spacers are you experiencing any vibration at highway speeds? I got s55 rims to put on my e55 but cant find the right spacer to use, it just barely touches the calipers in the front.

99lightning

i got these for my front skinnies but that is far as they go on i bought the correct size for center bore on front.

nemiro

Had a similar problem with spacer recently added to my vehicle. Turned out to be corrosion on the hub side, and excess powdercoat on the wheel side. A few minutes with some emery cloth, and everything fits as it should.

Andres Morejon

I am actually having the EXACT issue as you 99lightning. It's that the spacer has a lip that dosent let the spacer slide in any further. The only solution looks to be getting a non hub-centric rim. Both surfaces are clean but this is a hub to spacer issue, not a wheel to spacer one. Has anyone overcome this issue?

99lightning

yes it fits partway then it gets smaller perhaps a machine shop can bore it

Andres Morejon

Please update with what you end up doing!