I guess Ill just start by saying that the "spacer" was a nessecary evil to get the shafts out sometime this year. It wasnt my fault though it was my solution. good or bad- I dont really care, cause if its installed proper and one uses a little bit of mechanical apptitude to cure any minor issue one has with there setup- well then they work perfect.
Lets say I decide to replace a wheel bearing and use the big hammer method of installion(apply as much torque as possible to the spindle nut as I can muster, with my whimpy frame) I then try and turn the rotor/hub assembly, to my surprise the damb thing wont turn, F'it im just going to put the wheel back on and run it- I'll call the manufacturer and bitch about the bearing
Put the damn spacer in between the big bearing and the knuckle, it wont lock up the bearing or anything else. If your hex pin slot is a little deep shave the back of the hex down slightly until it doesnt drag. Now its all like apple pie:shock:"thumbsup"
I understand the reasoning behind the spacer. $h!t happens no matter what, I understand this more than anyone... What my comments you quoted are coming from is the lack of practical application of the "spacer fix". It works great if you loosely slap it together but if anyone with wraith/XR knuckles uses the spacer and clamps the bearings together with the hex instead of bottoming out on the pin, the aluminum washer will be acting as a loaded thrust bearing.
I installed it and as soon as I snugged up the wheel nut to the point where it didnt rotate on the hex, the bearings had way too much preload and they would have worn out in no time at all due to the high side loads because they were improperly loaded/clamped.
An acceptable fix would have been to have a washer with a 10.0mm ID instead of a 9.75mm ID which forces you to place it between the ID portion of the bearing (that spins) and the knuckle wall that the large bearing sits against (which does not spin). If it were larger it would have been properly placed between the large bearing and the stub shaft which would have been on a stationary joint and achieved the proper "fix". The other possible option is to do what I did, which is to use .3mm worth of 6mm ID and 8mm OD spacers between the small bearing and the stub shaft. Any more and the bearing got too much loading by the wheel nut and any less caused the pin to be loaded with the wheel nut.
The options are to use the spacer and create a connection between moving and non moving parts and hope the wheel nut when tightened down doesnt create too much of a bind. If the pin breaks, your wheel will more than likely stop spinning since the pin is the only thing giving the spacer a gap to a thrust surface. The other option is to use your own spacers with the correct diameters to achieve the same intended result as the supplied spacer but without the downsides.
If you would send out spacers to all the owners of these shafts with the correct diameter to function PROPERLY, your fix would be valid. As it is, you wasted money on a fix that only works when the wheel nut is bolted against the pin and the back side of the hex doesnt touch the smaller bearing.
Also, I used a 1/4" nut driver to tighten the wheel nut, the same thing I have used on my other 3 cars and not had an issue with except when I used junk hex's one time on my XR but since then, zero issues in 8 or so comps and hundreds of battery packs. You can imply that I dont have any mechanical aptitude if you'd like but keep it to yourself since you honestly have no idea who I am or what I'm capable of.
So, to follow up to your "just install it" comment; No. If it had the correct diameter then it would, but as it is, it's another useless washer to throw in the spare washers bin.
Keep in mind my comments are based on the fact that I'm asuming there is roughly a 0.25mm axial tolerance between parts. If there is a 0.50mm deviation, it could have a place on the far extreme end but it would still create a rotating metal to stationary metal connection.
"thumbsup"