P500 Wheel spacer Rob horsepower?

Steve00

Steve00

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I have a p500 I just put 1.5 ATV spacers and I think I notice a decrease in Horsepower while trying to plow through Sugar Sand am I imagining this or do wheel spacers Rob horsepower?
 
SWB

SWB

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Anytime you add weight to rotating mass it robs horsepower. But, don't know if you would notice that/ What is total weight?
 
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Alan_Vander

Alan_Vander

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probably but your talking about adding maybe .5-.75 lbs to a set of 120-160lb tires.

Sent from my moto z3 using Tapatalk
 
HUCK

HUCK

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Send some of that stuff you been smoking . ;)
 
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Bruce4795

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I have a p500 I just put 1.5 ATV spacers and I think I notice a decrease in Horsepower while trying to plow through Sugar Sand am I imagining this or do wheel spacers Rob horsepower?

I have a P5 with 26 inch tires and 2 inch wheel spacers. I'm a mechanical engineer, retired. To answer your question, I doubt you could notice any HP loss with 1.5 inch wheel spacers. They add a slight amount to the rotating mass of the wheel which would insignificantly reduce your acceleration, not from loss of HP, rather you are accelerating a wheel assembly with a slightly higher moment of inertia. Larger tires have much more impact than wheel spacers on wheel moment of inertia. You can get a feel for moment of inertia with the following example: imagine you pick up a 1/2 inch diameter piece of pipe that is a foot long and twirl it like a baton. Not much of a problem. Now make the pipe 8 feet long and you would really struggle to get it moving. Moment of inertia has to do with the amount of mass and how far from the center of rotation it is placed. Your wheel spacers are close to the axle with minimal impact on the moment of inertial. Larger tires add mass further away from the axle thus have more of an impact.
Other than accelerating, you should not notice any loss of HP from wheel spacers. BTW, I did not notice any loss of power with my 26 inch tires.
 
monaco

monaco

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I have a p500 I just put 1.5 ATV spacers and I think I notice a decrease in Horsepower while trying to plow through Sugar Sand am I imagining this or do wheel spacers Rob horsepower?
I have the 2" RB3 spacers all the way around and I've noticed no power difference. They're quite lightweight, compared to a big heavy tire upgrade. Now that, you'll notice.
 
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Jbutler

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Sep 17, 2016
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At our RB3 we have made them a light weight Wheel spacer. They are strong but light weight!!!
 
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Russ989

Russ989

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I had 1.5” on all four of my 700-4 and I didn’t notice any loss of power.
 
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