help...stuck lug nuts
 

i need some expert advise here. i took my truck to a local tire shop to have my tires rotated (these are stock wheels and tires...first time rotating). come to find out they weren't able to remove 2 of the 6 lug nuts on the drivers side rear. they said they tried everything they could being careful not to strip them. they refered me to a nearby repair shop that could take a look at it, but they quoted me 1 hour of labor to get it removed...one lug nut costing 1 hour of labor?!?! i said forget it. i got home and i wanted to see just how tight they where myself. i was standing on the wrench myself (205lbs) and that thing didn't budge at all. i'm tight on cash so i need any advise on how to get these bad boys off. do you think heating it up w/ a small propane torch might help?

get a long piece of pipe and a helper and snap that mother off. use the mechanical advantage to your benefit. then just put new wheel studs in

studs arent that expensive and are easy to change

Sounds like somebody cross-threaded those bad-boys! I bet it was some grease-monkey who didn't know that you were supposed to thread the lugnut on by hand first, before tightening them with the impact wrench.

I watched a guy at WalMart put all four wheels back on a car once by putting the lugnuts in the end of the impact wrench and then threading them on with the wrench. When I asked him if he knew why it was wrong to do that, he said he had been doing it that way for years.

You really only have one option...so you might as well go for it. If they break, like others have said, the studs are easy to replace. Maybe you will get lucky and they won't break. Either way, you have to try.

You're not likely to snap 'em off TAKING 'em off! Not unless they ARE crossthreaded. Which I doubt they are. If you crossthreaded one of those, it's gonna break off before you ever get it tight. They call for 150lbs. of torque any way, which is a lot. Like the one poster said, put a cheater pipe on a breaker bar and I'll bet any money it comes off. I have had tires installed where they used an impact wrench and were so tight I thought I'd break the breaker bar getting them off, but they have always come off. I've never seen a stud break TAKING THEM OFF, unless it WAS crossthreaded. Those aren't tire installers, they're KNUCKLEHEADS!

the torch might work, but id be hesitant to take a torch to my wheels :eek:

take a chain-link fence post and put it on the end of a wrench lol

I definitely would not use a torch near your aluminum wheels. Studs are cheap...a new wheel isn't!

My truck came new with 3 or 4 lug nuts tight like this. Like was suggested, I got a 3 ft piece of pipe and brute forced them off. One was so tight I had to stand on the pipe and wound up putting a twist in my lug wrench, but it broke free. All are fine now.

This is why I have posted a couple of times when people complain about how tight the oil filter is from the factory that they check their lug nuts too. You don't want to find this when you're on the side if the road with a flat.

i'll give the breaker bar a try...i found a 25" one at Harbor Freight Tools for $13.00. another question...worst case to happen is the lug nut gets striped...then what?

Do you happen to know someone with a good 1/2" impact? If so I would give that a shot. If not use the breaker bar (no extention) and jump on that SOB until the nut comes loose, stud breaks, breaker bar breaks, or you break. If the nut strips out you'll have to either figure out a way to cut it off, or weld a nut on the end of it which would probably just break the weld since they are on so tight. You can also try hittin the nut with a good punch and a hammer or hitting the end of breaker bar with the hammer to try and get loosened up enough. Good lucK

$13 for 25" is a rip off. you don't need something that is branded as a breaker bar. you just need a piece of pipe that is 1.5"-2", by 3'-4' long.

are the nuts stripped at all? is there any play when you put the socket on? if so, I'd try and get a pair of vise grips on there. A trick my brother once mentioned was getting the vise grip on as tight as you can by hand, then take another set of vise grips, and turn the nob as much as it'll go after the first one is locked on.

shoot some penetrating oil in there too.

i wouldn't waste my money on harbor freight junk, just take a good ratchet and a piece of pipe, like 6 footer and tighten it and then try to loosen it. that should crack the lug loose and then let you loosen it. this was worked several times for me, impacts are great, but more times that not you strip the lugs trying to get stubborn lugs off. are these stock lugs or aftermarket?

ATOM
i'll try that tightening and loosening trick and see if that'll work. and these are stock lugs

I had the same thing happen to me last week, walmart couldnt get 3 lugs off the driver rear. I bought a $5 can of PB Blaster and in 2 seconds they came right off.

just bust them loose. everyone is right, replacing studs is easy. I use my floor jack handle as a breaker bar, or a all steel shovel that has a D for a handle.

Breaker bar
 

Go to your closest home depot or lowes, or similar home improvment center. Ask someone for black steel pipe. They can be found in the water hook up area. make sure you take your lug wrench or ratchet with you so you can make sure your bar will go around the tool. I bought a 48" peice of this for about $8 at homedepot. VERY handy...and no worries about the bar breaking and causing injury...

Squirt some lube on it. Tighten the two opposite lugs as much as possible. Then wrench the one that is stuck as tight as possible if you can make it any tighter. Then loosen it. I had to do this on a couple chebby work vans that had some seized up lugs. Worked pretty well but I did need a helper pipe for some leverage. Just my 2 cents, Good luck!

Quit bein a little girl and put some muscle into it :lol: What they said about the pb blaster should work, if they are crossthreaded its not gonna be fun breaking em loose.

Best idea yet- don't even have to go to the store for that. I have complete set including breaker bar and ratchet in both metric and US in 3/4in. and I'll bet you're not gonna break those. Use that jack handle on that and it'll be off in a heartbeat.

Torque 'em back at 150 lbs.

Did you get them off?

brake them with an autodrill and get some newones to replaced them

update:
gotta 4 foot pipe. gave pb blaster a shot as well. i held the wrench in place while my buddy positioned himself to stand on the pipe (he weighs more than me) and nothing. the lug nut actually striped a little bit. tried the other stuck lug and same out come. waiting for the weekend to see my brother in law - the mechanic guru and see what he can do. he said worst case...we'll just grind that SOB off and replace the stud and lug nuts. this sucks but what other options do i have????

an idiot at walmart put one of my lug nuts on cross threaded one time during a tire change on my ranger and i broke my lug wrench trying to get that sucker off. it was a 4 way lug wrench and it snapped that arm completely off. im a big guy (6'3" 260lbs) and when it broke my butt went flying to the ground lol, so be careful.

did you get it off, if so...how?

use a dremel with that tiny cutting disc and start cutting, then take a chisel and break it off. that's how i'd do it, gonna have to replace the stud, but oh well. just start in 1 place and get a nice deep cut and then crack it a good one with a chisel, it should brake the rest of the way or at least open up some.

if i do that, i should be able to just cut the lug and keep the stud intact...shouldn't i?

maybe, if your careful with the chisel, just maybe...but that lug is gonna take a good crack to break.

i might just give that a try tomorrow

If you are lazy, go by a local big rig repair shop and have them put a 3/4" impact on the nut. That sucker will snap realllll quick.

If you've got a 4' pipe and you can't either get it to break loose or break it off, you need to eat more Wheaties! :banana:

You can go to a tool supply shop and buy a nut splitter. Cost about 7 or 8 bucks and it will probably save the stud. After that, go to the original place the nuts were put on and show the manager the nuts and and your receipts for the tools/parts.

HYPO

i do think he is gonna be able to use a nut splitter, there no room, good idea though

I went to a coal processing plant near my parents house and got my brother-in-law to use a 3/4" impact gun on it. It took a little bit and quite a bit of lubricant but it came off.

stoped by a local pep boys shop on the way home. service manager was really cool (Patrick - Chandler, AZ Pep Boys on Arizona Ave), he had 3 of his guys take a stab at it and nothing. it was a challenge for them and i can see that they were putting their all into it. needless to say, they're having me come back tomorrow. one of them w/ a longer breaker bar and another w/ a 3/4 impact. basically free of charge...so the story continues

Dam, no luck with a 3/4 inch impact? I thought for sure 1000 foot pounds would break it loose. Go find a big rig shop with a 1 inch impact.... if that doesn't work....

Another trick you might want to try is the following...

Lift the truck up, get the lug nuts that you can off, then remove the jack stand, and then pop the jack and let the truck fall on the wheel. You might even hear a pop. You can try it a few times even.
:smoke:

hope you don't get a flat tire......

I've had to do this to my previous truck because I didn't rotate the tires for like a year.

If it pops the tire... then I'd say you are in deep water... because I'd be more worried about buying some new tires.

no, they're having me come back tomorrow. they'll have the 3/4 impact tomorrow.

i wonder if someone loctited your lug nut on? i have heard of people being funny guy doing this, also loctiting spark plugs in......lol.....except if you buy it, then not so funny.