unbelievable - 411 driven for first time in 9 years

[Rubbond]

Hi guys. I'm Frank. Didn't fit in. Left home. Now use Tele2. This is my
story.
Actually mine is worse!
2 years ago I picked up my Range Rover from my trusted local garage after a
service and drove it 5 miles home.
The next morning after 20 miles on the motorway the car started to shake and
got worse as I slowed down to take the nearest exit.
Walked around the car and saw nothing wrong.
When the equivalent of the AA arrived, I drove slowly forward on his
instructions and as he looked the front left wheel almost fell off.
4 of the 5 wheel nuts were missing, only one just hanging on the end of the
stud.
This is when I learned in an emergency to pinch nuts from the other three
wheels just to get home.
The owner of the garage was very apologetic, admitted his blame, and stood
the cost of the new nuts. I had never experienced this before. I mean the
apology.
A year later, I had new brake pads fitted to my wife's Discovery at the same
garage. After 2 miles she told me there was a strange vibration. This was in
itself unique. Women don't notice these things, at least if the radio is
still working, let alone report them. Normally she would just have dumped it
and taken another car, just as she would when the fuel is about to run out.
(This is not a racist comment - all women do this).
I know I should give her a bigger allowance.
On this occasion however, I was able to hand-tighten (yes, I mean litterally
with my fingers!) the remaining wheel nuts to drive back to the garage
before the wheel fell off. This time there was just no extra charge.
You've guessed it, I don't use this this garage any more. Actually they
dumped me, because I didn't pay their last bill.
But blow me, after driving 800 miles last year after another major service
on our other Discovery, with no problems on the motorways all the way to the
West Country in England, after 2 miles back up from our cottage in Devon,
one front wheel again almost fell off , this time with 3 nuts missing!
Having spent an extra night there with no help from the AA, (they couldn't
find Devon) the next morning the local garage refused to do the same trick
(i.e. switching nuts) for liability reasons (!!!) but I was able to borrow
their wheel wrench to switch them around myself. (Yes, our wheel wrench was
missing. Always check the tool kit when buying a second hand car).
Arriving in Exeter, I drove into Matford Land Rover to buy 3 new wheel nuts.
They were about 11 GBP, excl. VAT, each! The people there were very
helpfull, even fitting them for free, but at that price my initial thoughts
that maybe Land Rover's stainless steel nuts might just get loose because
they don't rust, or that the garages might be at fault, changed into the
idea that the nuts were simply so expensive that thieves might be trying to
nick back the wheel nuts they lost the night before.
As Land Rover dealers are so few and far between, this is plausible, isn't
it?
Yesterday I lost another one (well, at least the false cap on the one that
should be thief-proof).
Strange, because without the special tool, you can't remove this cap.
Is this just Land Rover?
PS. To finish this story. To tighten a wheel nut, normally you just take the
longest wrench you have and give it all you can. That should do it. They
only fall off if all the nuts are loose.
Best regards,
Rubbond.

[geo]

Bad luck Kevin, but like others have suggested, on my 408s and my 412 I found that even with copious amounts of Copaslip the nuts were always a pretty tight fit on the studs and could imagine that a torque-sensitive gun could come to the wrong conclusion.

I do remember assisting a friend with removing the steel wheels from his 406 and discovering that someone had so over-tightened them there were fatigue cracks emanating from the holes.

Originally Posted by rubbond

I drove into Matford Land Rover to buy 3 new wheel nuts.
They were about 11 GBP, excl. VAT, each! The people there were very
helpfull,
Rubbond.

From my memory of some years ago when I lived at Haytor Vale, the Matford people were helpful, but the nice people at Brookwells, Pottery Road, Bovey Tracey will do you a set of five for under £30. Incidentally, the steel ones for Series 2, 2A, & 3 are 60 pence each!

George

[RGSchmitt]

Never had a problem with loose wheel nuts, but frequently just the
opposite - wheel changers who torque the nuts with an airgun at the
gorilla setting. Problem: you need to get the wheel off and NOTHING
budges the nut. I finally bought a truck-sized breaker bar and an
extension handle and check all the nuts after any wheel service.

Bob

[Rubbond]

Okay. Try this for size.
Last year I sheared off three or four nuts from the wheels of one of our
water thingies for the horses.
The base was a pre-war axle from a truck.
Did I or did I not know that they were clever enough then to put right-hand
threads on the left-hand wheels?
(Or the other way around, I'm that stupid).
Anyway, I wrecked the whole thing as a result..
I still think a good "wrench" (in the old-fashioned sense) is good enough to
tighten up normal wheel nuts.
Good luck!
With best regards,
Andrew.

[Jon McCarthy]

Kevin,

In my experience I reckon you have put your finger on the most likely
culprit, the plating of the wheel nuts.

Back in my "yoof" I raced an Austin Healey Sprite Mk2A as one of a team of
three from the MGCC Qld Centre. One of the cars had chromed wheels and nuts
which were for ever coming loose. The owner was very proud of its appearance
until he kept having the wheels flapping. Not something you want on a race
track. To say the scrutineers were unhappy was to put it mildly and he soon
changed the wheels & nuts.

I suspect that the thickness of plating is variable more on small
dimensioned items like nuts. These are very small relative to most things in
a plating tank.

Worth having a very close look and measurements taken maybe under the
microscope.

Regards

Jon McCarthy

[Kevin H]

Jon,
I hope you are wrong because the nickel plated nuts look great and the alternative - stainless nuts from Bristol - cost the earth.

If the plating was the cause surely it would have affected all four wheels?

I guess I will find out pretty quickly when I get the car registered and start driving it.

Regards,
Kevin