Can I use by rear wheel with a missing Freehub body washer, and what is its purpose?

Question

I noticed that my rear wheel had some left to right play on the axle but tightening up the axle prevented the freehub spinning. After removing the freehub I discovered that the freehub body washer was bent out of shape, causing the the freehub to kink when the axle was tightened.

Its a Merlin hub and I cannot find a replacement on their website and the original is too bent to take measurements off to buy a different brand.

I don't see what the washer is actually doing, there is a spacer on the axle which keeps the freehub body away from that part of the hub. Is it safe to use the freehub without the washer?

Answer 1

Where I have seen this before, a siezed bearing had worn down the spacer/washer. Removing the play by tightening the axle pushed the freehub too hard into the hub, locking the two together. It sounds like you have a similar situation. The gap between the hub bearing and freehub bearing needs to be set correctly by that spacer, washer etc