Why are wheel spacers so expensive?

[Billy Bee]

I can't understand why spacers need to cost so much. I want to put chains on the rear of my TC 33, and not enough clearance, hence the spacers. I worked in a machine shop 40 years ago and it looks like any well equipped shop could make them easily. They look like glorified washers, not gold coins. I realize there would be many different thicknesses and bolt patterns, so maybe not a high volume item, but seems like an awful lot of money for what they are. There, I had to vent on somebody, and nobody is home so you're elected. Thanks, I feel better now.
Bill

 

[George2615]

That's what I did several years ago on another tractor. I made up front and side view drawings with width and bolt spacing dimensions and gave it to a friend at a local machine shop. Mine were 2" wide with a 6 bolt on 6" spacing. His boss let him make me up a set in his spare time off hours for $100.

 

[Deere Dude]

That's what I did several years ago on another tractor. I made up front and side view drawings with width and bolt spacing dimensions and gave it to a friend at a local machine shop. Mine were 2" wide with a 6 bolt on 6" spacing. His boss let him make me up a set in his spare time off hours for $100.

X2 That is a good idea.

 

[Leejohn]

I checked into a 8" X 2 1/4" bar stock and that was $80.00 retail last year.

 

[Looking4new]

Bill, now you know why I don't have them.

 

[CCWKen]

There's a lot of force applied to spacers. You can't just make them out of anything and use Ching-Chang hardware. Good costs. Cheap is dangerous.

 

[mad_planter]

I can't understand why spacers need to cost so much. I want to put chains on the rear of my TC 33, and not enough clearance, hence the spacers. I worked in a machine shop 40 years ago and it looks like any well equipped shop could make them easily. They look like glorified washers, not gold coins. I realize there would be many different thicknesses and bolt patterns, so maybe not a high volume item, but seems like an awful lot of money for what they are. There, I had to vent on somebody, and nobody is home so you're elected. Thanks, I feel better now.
Bill

I would imagine there cost as much as they do because the people making them would like to actually make a little money for themselves after they get through paying all their overhead, such as machinery payments, building rent or mortgage, insurance, wages, etc, etc.

Its never the cost of the material and the couple of hours to machine it, its all the overhead that goes into having a business and making a living.

 

[MORRISONSTEEL]

The machine shops in our area have so much work to do and too many customers that are willing to pay a premium that there is no such thing as a cheap fab project anymore.

 

[NoTrespassing]

How much do they cost retail?

Kevin

 

[crazyal]

Don't forget about the insurance. You bring it to your local guy and say make this he has no way of knowing if it's the right design for the job so suing him would be hard. You buy a product designed for a task and it fails then you can go back to the company that made it and sue. While it may not be likely but imagine if you were doing work with your tractor and your son was near the tire when it broke. A loaded wheel falling over sideways could hurt pretty badly.