What's their purpose?

I'm machining a set of sport bike wheels to sumo my XR and for the front, the easiest method to get it to fit is to just machine some off each side, which will unfortunately remove the snap ring groove. Short of boring the center hole out and creating a new snap ring groove, I'll have to run without.

Can anyone see any catastrophic failure resulting from this choice? As I see it, the bearings are held in pretty well (inner race anyways) with the spacer and axle, and the outer race is hardly going to start shifting on its own (press fit and all). Also, if the outer race _does_ move, I have bigger problems than a missing snap ring.

My dirt wheels have no snap ring..

Thanks for any opinion.