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Hey guys, I'm at the drag strip and went to swap my wheels, and broke a wheel stud. I'm not happy! Whats the best route to fix it? Is there an upgrade available? Thx guys!
Hey guys, I'm at the drag strip and went to swap my wheels, and broke a wheel stud. I'm not happy! Whats the best route to fix it? Is there an upgrade available? Thx guys!
Buy a torque wrench.
The stock studs are fine for drag racing unless you are using a breaker bar to tighten the nuts. Close to 100% of the wheel stud breakage I have observed during many years of racing purpose built drag cars was caused by not properly tightening nuts.
Remember the wheel is held on by the compression between wheel and whatever it is being bolted to. If you put most any wheel stud into shear it will probably fail. The reason for larger diameter/better material studs is so you can increase the clamping force without breaking the bolt from tightening tension.
Excessive torque (often delivered via an impact wrench) or excessive bending force (for example using a hinged breaker bar where the socket isn't directly in-line with the handle which simultaneously applies desired rotational force and an undesired bending moment) are common reasons for shearing/breaking a stud.
A stud severely stretched via a fast tire change monkey equipped with an impact will often fail the next time the wheel is changed or the stud is otherwise stressed.
Over on the truck forums I was just taking a beating for admonishing against pulling studs in with an impact to install them. I advocate pressing them in (granted, sometimes you gotta do what you gotta do, but in general). I can't prove it but I think stretching studs (esp. past their yield point) weakens them.
Thanks guys. I was removing the lug (by hand) when it happened and I do not use an impact. I do it by hand and always torque to 105 ft/lbs. Not sure what happened?
Has anyone else upgraded to ARP wheel studs? Will they work with the factory lugs?
Yes they work well, but they are longer than the factory lugs so need pass through nuts. At least those that I bought for my race car. They may make a stock length set however. However I have run the oem lug nuts on a race car for years without a problem. You may have had a bad one. I would likely just replace with a factory replacement.
In fact if anyone wants the ARP studs, let me know. I am pretty sure I have several unopened packages over at the garage and I got rid of the race car some time ago.
Were you running 18x13 rear wheels by chance? I broke a stud on my my 2015 because the wheel was contacting the UCA and binding the wheel trying to move the lug nut. None of the electric impact guns I use will put enough pressure to over-torque a lug nut. With a fresh charge it will get very close to 100 lb/ft but I almost always need to tighten them a bit more with the torque wrench.
I ended up replacing all four wheels with ARP studs but they are longer. If someone has a part number for stock length ARP studs I'd love to know it because I couldn't find it. I ended up cutting the ARP studs down to stock length but otherwise you do need an open nut.
Replacing the studs in front if they are stock length isn't bad. The rears are a pain though because of the parking brake assembly and I ended up paying someone to do them.
Last edited by Poor-sha; Apr 29, 2018 at 05:12 PM.
Guys, can anyone verify that the ARP wheel studs are the same thread pattern as the factory lugs? I'm trying to decide if I need to buy open ended lugs for these studs?
The above link gives you the specs: M12 X 1.5 X 2.0
Therefore they use the same nuts. These appear shorter than the ones I have so open ended nuts will not be necessary. Mine were bought for a race car and the tech inspectors demand open ended nuts and want to see the nut completely catching all the threads they can.
The above link gives you the specs: M12 X 1.5 X 2.0
Therefore they use the same nuts. These appear shorter than the ones I have so open ended nuts will not be necessary. Mine were bought for a race car and the tech inspectors demand open ended nuts and want to see the nut completely catching all the threads they can.
I saw the link above but I wasn't sure of the length and thread pattern of my stock OEM wheel studs? Is that what M12 means? Thanks!
I was putting on Powerstop brake pads last week and thought i was going to break my back getting the lug nuts off. 4ft. breaker bar and i thought I would break a stud or the bar. Twisted off one socket and figured i was in trouble. Luckily everything worked out. When i torqued them down I now know they were crazy over tight. Brake pads are great. The dust made me not want to drive as much. Now, awesome! JMO.
I was putting on Powerstop brake pads last week and thought i was going to break my back getting the lug nuts off. 4ft. breaker bar and i thought I would break a stud or the bar. Twisted off one socket and figured i was in trouble. Luckily everything worked out. When i torqued them down I now know they were crazy over tight. Brake pads are great. The dust made me not want to drive as much. Now, awesome! JMO.
Be careful. If the nuts were way over the torque spec the studs have been strained beyond their yield point.
Once you do this the clamp force between wheel and it's attachment point with stock torque applied is less. If the wheel slips on it's attachment surface you are looking at broken studs. The studs do not do well in shear.
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