Do you check your wheelnuts after having tyres fitted?

[duncanh]

I had two new front tyres last week. Last night I thought that a wheel bearing had gone as I was getting a horrible noise from the front offside wheel area. I pulled over and found the wheelnuts loose. They needed a full half turn each to tighten them. I checked the nearside front, they needed about a quarter turn each to tighten.

I know that it is recommended that wheel nuts get re-checked after 50 miles, but does anybody really do this? I have never done so. Is it the same after a service (after all they take the wheels off)?

I suspect that they fitted the tyres/wheels, let down the jacks, and forgot the final torquing/tightening.

As the wheels are alloy, and one of them was rattling around on the hub, is the wheel likely to be damaged? I won't get a chance to look until Saturday.

Also is this likely to have damaged the hub/brearings or have caused accelerated wear?

I am waiting for a response from the manager of the tyre fitting centre (it is a local outfit, not a chain).

 

[television]

Interesting.

MB wheels are hub centric, that is the wheels center on a flange on the hub and a groove in the wheel see the enclosed picture of a hub.

Providing that flange on the hub is not damaged, or the grove in the wheel, then should be OK.

Each wheel should be taken off and these points check and the condition of the wheel bolt holes as alli is soft

 

[Quick Silver]

I had two new front tyres last week. Last night I thought that a wheel bearing had gone as I was getting a horrible noise from the front offside wheel area. I pulled over and found the wheelnuts loose. They needed a full half turn each to tighten them. I checked the nearside front, they needed about a quarter turn each to tighten.

I know that it is recommended that wheel nuts get re-checked after 50 miles, but does anybody really do this? I have never done so. Is it the same after a service (after all they take the wheels off)?

I suspect that they fitted the tyres/wheels, let down the jacks, and forgot the final torquing/tightening.

As the wheels are alloy, and one of them was rattling around on the hub, is the wheel likely to be damaged? I won't get a chance to look until Saturday.

Also is this likely to have damaged the hub/brearings or have caused accelerated wear?

I am waiting for a response from the manager of the tyre fitting centre (it is a local outfit, not a chain).

Most reputable tyre companies (I use Costco Mitchelin) and its always on their invoice to check wheel bolt torque after 100 miles which you sign a disclaimer for after the job is completed . Mostly I do check the torque but not always .The torque figures that they have been tightened to are always on the invoice as well and they never use an air gun , always done by hand.

 

[popuptoaster]

I annoy them by not letting them use an airgun to tighten mine up either, but then i usually insist on being somewhere i can see what they are doing, bit easier to be a pain with a 35 year old car i guess as they expect me to be a bit weird.

 

[LYNALL]

Always check mine after tyre change.



Lynall

 

[Alex M Grieve]

Always check mine after tyre change.
Lynall

I do too. I know I am not obsessional because I always feel a sense of surprise that I remembered to do it, and actually did it!

I have always found them correctly tightened.

 

[dougjoy]

With the locking wheel nuts I tighten them myself rather than let them tighten them to the same torque as the normal wheel nuts. I have had it once where the locking nut sheered when I tried to remove it after new tyres were fitted. It took me for ever to drill the stub out. Never again.

 

[Rory]

Most reputable tyre companies (I use Costco Mitchelin) and its always on their invoice to check wheel bolt torque after 100 miles which you sign a disclaimer for after the job is completed . Mostly I do check the torque but not always .The torque figures that they have been tightened to are always on the invoice as well and they never use an air gun , always done by hand.

Costco (at least the branch I use at Chester) are certainly the most careful tyre fitters I've ever experienced. I'm pretty sure other places just wang the bolts up and then check that the torque wrench clicks, rather that tightening to that torque.

The question about checking after servicing has long intrigued me too - I don't recall ever being asked to recheck the nuts/bolts so one wonders why tyre places pretty well always ask you to do it?

Having said that, daughter's Ibiza came back from SEAT dealers recently with wheel bolts irremoveable by hand tools and it was everything my impact driver could do to undo them.

 

[MBDevotee]

I have had dreadful experience with Tyre fitters..

Kwik fit - 4 wheels barely finger tight - drove about 1/4 mile then heard a bad rumble, pulled over, and found the wheel nuts completely loose.

Tried to nip them up and drove super carefully back to Kwik fit - who's attitude was "ah well no harm done". Letter to head office and call to regional Director later, attitude was STILL "No harm done, no-one was killed, got off a lawsuit there...!" - needless to say will never visit a Kwik-Fit again.

Other experiences include wheel nuts so tight they can't be undone with a blowlamp and power bar!

I now go to a place locally who are pretty good, only use Torque Wrenches to do up the nuts and don't employ 12 year old retards!!!

Prices are also pretty good.

Formula 1st in Weston super Mare (big yellow store) - very good.

 

[wireman]

In addition to making sure that the wheels are nicely torqued up check your tyre pressures as well.
Most fitters do but I have on occasion found them at the silly high pressures used to get the tyre firmly on the rim, the fitter having forgten to set the pressures after putting them onto the car.

 

[howzat1976]

Hi, I use to have a lexus GS300 with 20's. Never allowed anyone use an airgun on the bolts. On one occasion the clown at Iverson Tyres broke a couple of bolts with his gun and the then got the right hump when I told him to use a torque wrench.

What is it with tyre fitters and there airguns???

Vas

 

[turbopete]

tyre fitters only use them coz they usually cant be bothered to look for a wheelbrace or a torque wrench! the airguns arent perfect though. once worked in a garage where 1 of the guys couldnt move wheelnuts with his airgun and 200psi instead of 90psi going through it. the ca was on a wheelfree 2 post ramp. i set the hubs at chest height, picked up a 4 leg 'spider' wheelbrace, then undid all wheelnuts! needless to say his reliance on his airgun diminished greatly after that! lol!