No grease on lug nuts

Let me guess - you don't live where they dump salt on the roads.

-jim

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Grease on lug nuts is a great idea, because it would help prevent them from rusting on.

HOWEVER, every car and manual I've ever seen always says or implies that's a clean dry nut and stud.

For example, my TA requires 100 foot-pounds. If you grease it up, it's probably 70 or so, so if you apply 100, you're doing the equivalent of

130 or so dry... and you're gonna strip it or snap the stud.

And so, I always* do lug nuts dry.

*except for my Subaru, which had grease on them went I went to rotate the tires yesterday. At this point, I don't know if that's normal for a Subaru to have that - it's a used car, so they could be factory greased, they could be home owner greased. They're the same size as my TA yet only call for 58-72 foot-pounds, so I went with 60 and left the grease on.

Ray

I forgot to mention there are certain fancy cars that call for certain pounds of torque when tightnening the lug nuts.I always use my 4 way lug wrench and tighten them to what I think is sufficient, I have never had any problem getting them off if I tighten them, none of them has ever worked loose either.I carry a 4 foot long cheater pipe in my van because some of those tire shops sometimes get them too tight.Perhaps certain cars do call for lubeing the lug nuts, I don't know.

I don't live near a beach (salt) and in the Wintertime for icey roads, bridges, and overpasses, they use sand.In salty areas, durn near everything under those cars gets messed up from the salt.Many years ago, I took an old junk yard bicycle with me in my van when I was on vacation in Daytona Beach.I rode that bicycle around on the beach, it got soaking wet all over from the salt water.I haden't thought to wash the salty water off of the bicycle at one of those wash off places on the beach.The next day, that bicycle was just like somebody had welded up every piece of that bicycle. cuhulin

I've got LOADS of opinions...and they're all free. some of 'em are worth the price too:)

Up here in Salt Country (NE Ohio), we lightly coat the backface of aluminum wheels with antisieze as well as a dab on the wheel studs. Otherwise, they tend not to come off without major swearing, pounding and possible damage.

Too much and it will squeeze out and make a mess on your nice wheels...been dere, still cleaning it off...

NEVER NEVER NEVER "grease" them with anything! always use good quality copper (or lead) antisieze. Otherwise you might be going down the road late one night on the B57 in Germany and have your rear end drop and your wheel whiz past you....yes, that DID happen to me when I was much younger... NO GREASE!

hope I was clear :)

--Don

Don Byrer KJ5KB Radar Tech & Smilin' Commercial Pilot Guy Glider & CFI wannabe kj5kb-at-hotmail.com

"I have slipped the surly bonds of earth; now if I can just land without bending the gear..." "Watch out for those doves..."

Antiseize compounds have the effect of lowering friction as well. I have only seen a lugnut loosen once in my life, and it was because I had not tightened that wheel....Yep, I was late for a date, and did a poor job. That was never repeated.

Although I value your experience, I do not subscribe to the story that grease will allow a properly tightened lugnut to loosen.