One of my wheels fell off

Post by **Ozark Lee** » 17 Mar 2011, 13:50

I got a call from my wife this morning and she said that something really big broke on the '94. I took her my daughter's S70 to keep her moving and tried to drive the '94 home - I made it about half way when the frikking left front wheel came off. As I was driving it I thought it was an axle that was falling apart. After the last lug stud came out the car obviously lost drive but fortunately the wheel didn't completely fall off of the car, it held on the locater pin.

Finding lugs is a challenge beyond the dealership but Car Quest had them. I bought 5 new lugs and took over a jack to put the wheel back on.

The rub is that one of the threads on the hub is buggered up so I drove it back home with 4 lugs.
I am set up to get the threads chased out on the hub at KC Autosport on Monday morning but does anyone know what the stud threads are? I took the stud into Lowes and it seemed to fit both the M-12/1.75 and the 1/2" / 13 test nuts in the hardware department.

The only thing I can figure is that someone was trying to swipe the wheels and got scared off, leaving one lug on the wheel. Everything was fine until this morning and I don't buy that all of the lugs fell out without warning.

...Lee

cdnbluez · Post by **cdnbluez** » 17 Mar 2011, 14:46

You're lucky she called, my wife would have kept on driving! "Noise? What noise?"

Post by **jblackburn** » 17 Mar 2011, 15:44

Why the @#$@^ would you try to steal the wheels off a Volvo? Well, at least it didn't fall off and you crashed!

You'd almost think you live in Durham, Lee.

Post by **confused_al** » 17 Mar 2011, 16:31

I know exactly how that feels! I had one fell off my MB last summer, since some moron (dont ask who

) forgot tighten the lug bolts on one wheel after replacing brake fluid. I was lucky the damage was minimum, only one thread was massed up and I was able to tab it out.
The size is M12x1.75.

Mbnorris · Post by **Mbnorris** » 17 Mar 2011, 16:38

I've been a machinist for 15+ years so I think I can help. If the stud you have screws in both M12/1.75 and 1/2-13 nut then I'm bout 90%+ sure that you have a M12/1.75 stud. Only 90% because you just don't know how many times a bolt has been screwed in and out of those thread checkers at Lowes. Converting metric to English to help simplify.
It breaks down like this:
Bolt size- Major dia of stud - Thread pitch
M12/1.75- 12mm or .472"- 1.75 or .069"
1/2-13- 1/2 or .500- 13 or .077

So basically the major dia and the thread pitch are close but not exact. Being as the 12mm major dia is smaller than the 1/2" is the reason why you can screw a M12/1.75 bolt in a 1/2-13 nut but you can't screw a 1/2-13 bolt into a M12/1.75 nut. Now I am talking about screwing them together by hand, with the proper power tools you can make it work either way but not recommended. There are a few other sizes of bolts that will do the same as these. So just be careful when you are using nuts to size bolts and visa versa. If you are having the threads chased then they should be able to figure out what the threads are. Good luck and I hope this helped explain it a bit.

Post by **misha** » 18 Mar 2011, 11:21

cdnbluez wrote:You're lucky she called, my wife would have kept on driving! "Noise? What noise?"

cdnbluez · Post by **cdnbluez** » 18 Mar 2011, 14:48

Alecw81 · Post by **Alecw81** » 18 Mar 2011, 22:07

Hey, I live in Raleigh and Durham.

I've also nearly driven wheels off before, on my last talon. I was hitting the corners on Palomar Mountain in SoCal, and popped 3 lugs and 2 studs on the back wheel, and 4 lugs and studs on the front.

Post by **jblackburn** » 18 Mar 2011, 23:43

That's where I'm from.

Sadly enough, stuff like that does happen in Durham all the time. Someone stole the spare wheel off my dad's Jeep a few years ago, and just a few weeks ago their grill was stolen off the deck during the night. It wasn't even a very nice grill