• Hi Guest!
    If you appreciate British Car Forum and our 25 years of supporting British car enthusiasts with technical and anicdotal information, collected from our thousands of great members, please support us with a low-cost subscription. You can become a supporting member for less than the dues of most car clubs.
    There are some perks with a member upgrade!
    **Upgrade Now**
    (PS: Subscribers don't see this gawd-aweful banner
Tips
Tips

Jellybean Mags

Share this page

RickB

RickB

Yoda
Offline
So what can be done to make them fit right?

The center hole is fine but the thickness of the material (aluminum) makes my lug studs too short.
They are fine for the steel wheels but the backing around the lug holes is very thick.

Also the holes are not exactly centered over the lug studs, they are off by just a little. The lug stud isn't exactly in the center of each hole and also each hole is bigger than the stud so there is about a half inch diameter hole and what are the standard lug studs? 5/16"?

I think I've seen this discussed before, so thought I'd ask.

The holes could be drilled out or filled and re-drilled or what other possibilities? Longer lug studs I suppose?
 

Attachments

  • 26383.jpg
    26383.jpg
    42.3 KB · Views: 371
All I can say is good luck with them. I tried for years to find a set and eventually gave up. I DID acquire a set, complete with lug nuts but the wheels used "UNILUGSS", an oval that goes into the lug hole to make it either a 4" circle or a 4 1/4" one. The problem was that the back set was wrong and the the tires stuck out too far for use on an SWA car. They're still in the garage.

The reason I wish you luck is that Sprite/Midget wheels are "lug centric" not "hub centric" meaning the the hub is not necessarily the center point of our rims. It sounds like you may have a metric 100mm circle instead of a 4" one.


As mentioned, I gave up. I picked up wheels from Hap and am pleased as punch.
 
Depending on the construction of the wheel, you may be able to have it redrilled for the 4" PCD, but it would require the services of a good machinist. Then you'd need to contend with the unsightly unused holes.
 
UPDATE:
I took one over to Bill's (BillM) house today after work.
It has the exact right lug spacing.
The only issue I have now is that it's a 6 inch wheel and I have a SWA car.
Ideas???
They will work great on the front - but the back would be tight.
 
Base ball bat or 2x6 rear wheel well flaring!! If you care about your car its probably not recomended!

Kurt.
 
Rick, standard Spridget wheel studs are 3/8". Sound like you have a 4x100mm set of wheels, the metrice conversion of 4x4' is 4x 101.6 if I remember correctly, so they are close to 4 x100mm, but not quite, and "not quite" doesn't work too well for wheel fitment, on thru bore shouldered lug nut or a tapered lug nut. Like Trevor said with some machine work, one could make them fit, if they are the correct offset or backsapcing, but probably more trouble than it's worth.
 
Many times in the past, we have machined wheels to accept a press in steel sleeve to correct wheel stud spacing differences. Then adapted lugs from other wheel types to fit or made custom lugs on the lathe from hex steel stock. We always have the lugs with "through-holes" and threaded all the way (or drilled a little larger on the top part of the lug) so that the wheels and lugs can fit a variety of stud lengths.

For the wheel studs, move the rear studs to the front and then purchase new longer Cooper 'S' wheel studs for the rear. This usually adds about 3/8 - 1/2" to the stud lengths. Some of the Spridget race suppliers also carry even longer 3/8" wheel studs for rear axle application.

As far as clearance for a SWA car, no solutions but to adjust back spacing. This can only be done by machining or sourcing another offset of the same type of wheel.

HTH,
Mike Miller
 
Ok - to be more specific BillM had the right mag lug nuts and we bolted up a wheel to a hub and it was perfect.

The only issue now is width - these are 6 inch wide wheels so I'm wondering if it's possible to get a tire on and fit it into the wheel well on a SWA rear?
Is there a tire that will fit in there?
I know it will work fine on front with the Bugeye front end, the back with the SWA seem to be a problem for a 6 inch wheel.
The PO had these fitted to a RWA car so he had no trouble.

The tub is a '78 Midget.
I don't have any care whatsoever for originality on this car.
I care about that on my MK2 Sprite, but not this car.
So - fender flaring is an option. How hard is that to do?
I have no idea how it's done.
 
I don't want to be the advocate of doing this cause it damaged the car I drove to LoTO to the point that it would require a good body man to fix it. On that car the PO demonstrated the procedure he used. Had it up on a hoist and took a big chunk of 2x6 against the top of the wheel and inside the wheel arch and pryed!!! I don't know what size of wheels and tires he was trying to clear at the time. Wheel offset is to be considered as well. I like Haps idea. Sell those wheels and buy some of his!!

My .02, Rick!

Kurt.
 
Thanks Kurt,
I would like a set of the Retro 4's from Hap and was set to buy them but then we had a couple things in the home that needed to be done instead.

These wheels are a style I really like and I already own them so making them work might be the least expensive route. They are 4x4 and not the 101.5mm wheels so they do bolt on to the hubs nicely.

That being said, they would work really well on a Bugeye or on an RWA Midget.
Selling them and applying the proceeds towards a set of Retro 4's would be an option if they were valuable enough to someone.
 
So, you've already converted the nose....why not graft in round arches on the rear and make it REALLY look "right"?
 
Mine's a '78 tub.
I just Sawzalled the fenders to the RWA-type radius. Then riveted the inner fender to the outer fender (because you have to saw away the area where they are connected. A little Bondo and, if you're careful, it can look OK. Mine's not perfect, but it's a racer, so I wasn't that worried.

pvgp-beaver-mccabe-2011-on-track-21.jpg
 
I love dish mags and would love to run a set on mine. I'm just retro that way.
 
I went over to a tire store after work, they showed me a nice 175 70 R13 and said they thought it would work well.
They are willing to try one on my car so I'm up for it.

My passenger side rear is the one with the least clearance so we will try it there. Also while it's on I'll get a couple guys to sit in the car to see if it rubs at all.
 
<div class="ubbcode-block"><div class="ubbcode-header">Quote:]Sawzalled the fenders to the RWA-type radius.[/QUOTE]

I want to do that too, but I don't have the stones for it... yet. How did you create the flare lip?
 
Back
Top