Lug nut bolts over tightened

[meerkatmag]

Hi all,
I've been changing the brake shoes today on my twin rear wheel transit mk3. The lug nuts on both sides were so insanely tight, I needed a breaker bar with a 3 meter steel tube on the handle, and i still needed to put all my force into the bar to get them to crack. The wheels were fitted by a garage that does trucks and I watched them use a massive air gun to tighten them up.

So my question is should they be that tight? And now i've put the wheels back on I've tightened them with my makita impact wrench and then checked them with the breaker bar and I can't get them any tighter. Is that sufficient? They are no where near as tight as they were before.

Cheers

[dumper]

You would be best tighten them with a torque wrench not sure of correct torque for a mk 3 long time since I done one

[joinerman]

Just torque them up to FT , lol

[Islander71]

Haynes manual gives a torque of 124 ft-lbs for the 6 stud wheel nuts.

[meerkatmag]

Haynes manual gives a torque of 124 ft-lbs for the 6 stud wheel nuts.

Thanks for that, I read that too. Just I've been scanning the forum threads about it and everyone says just torque as high as you can otherwise they tend to come loose. Just don't know how mad to go on them!

[Chug]

As tight as you can get them with a 2ft bar is my trusted method.

[Islander71]

I find on my mk3 twin wheeler camper you have to be very careful tightening the rear wheel nuts. Slightly tighten, shake the wheels to make sure they are properly seated, then gradually tighten going diagonally round a few times before using a torque wrench to make sure they are all even. Otherwise you can distort the brake drums and get truly horrific brake judder. Near side wheel nuts are left hand thread.

[dumper]

When I worked for a major UK bus company if a wheel came off a bus it was a sacking job if you was the last person to fit the wheel the way you fitted the wheels was first the matting surface was cleaned to a mirror finish before fitting to tighten the wheels you ran the nuts up with a 3/4 drive air gun and then torque up then you drive forward and hit the brakes hard and the same in reverse after that you had to do a figure or 8 in both directions and then do a re torque after a maximum of 200 miles they had a 3 rd re torque for spigot fitment or for cone type a fourth re torque after another 200 miles after that if any nut had turned more then a 1/3 of a turn or did more then 200 miles the wheel would have to come off and start all over again.

[meerkatmag]

I find on my mk3 twin wheeler camper you have to be very careful tightening the rear wheel nuts. Slightly tighten, shake the wheels to make sure they are properly seated, then gradually tighten going diagonally round a few times before using a torque wrench to make sure they are all even. Otherwise you can distort the brake drums and get truly horrific brake judder. Near side wheel nuts are left hand thread.

That's very interesting! Because I was trying to fix brake judder, I thought maybe something was going on with the shoes or the drum was warped. But to be honest the shoes and springs all looked fine once I got everything off, I changed the shoes and springs anyway. The drums looked totally fine and I couldn't separate the hub so I just popped them back on with a new rear bearing and seal. I was very careful with reassembling everything and tightened the lug nuts gradually and the brake judder has gone now. I was a bit surprised actually because I don't think I actually found anything wrong, but maybe the garage threw the lug nuts on too quickly and too tight? Does it make sense that it's gone back true without being permanently damaged?

Cheers

[dumper]

It’s always possible that a stud will snap I’ve had the snap on buses and trucks when they’ve been over tightened with an inch gun.

[V184]

I find on my mk3 twin wheeler camper you have to be very careful tightening the rear wheel nuts. Slightly tighten, shake the wheels to make sure they are properly seated, then gradually tighten going diagonally round a few times before using a torque wrench to make sure they are all even. Otherwise you can distort the brake drums and get truly horrific brake judder. Near side wheel nuts are left hand thread.

Even bigger problem on later models always pays to mark the wheels to stud/drum unless your fitting the spare