That Damn Nut

That would work!

I had the DT's...

Gee, next you'll be saying that you're supposed to check the air pressure in the tires and rotate them... Where do you come up with this stuff..... :-)

don't rotate, fix the alignment issue!

"Steve W." wrote in news:jZtIp.2351$ snipped-for-privacy@newsfe17.iad:

Hey, I got another one! There's this little metal stick that pokes out of the engine. If you pull it out once in a while and make sure it's oily on the end, the engine will last longer! Yeah, I'm such a radical.

I rarely rotate tires. I often have the alignment checked.

I got 125,000 miles out of a set of Bridgestones, and 90,000 out of a set of Dunlops, both OEM tires that came with the cars.

Unfortunately, these days you are more apt to have things made worse than better if you get an alignment job. There are very, very few folks I would trust to do it properly. They exist, but you have to look hard for them (and usually ask racing shops who the one guy in town is).

--scott

BMW and Mercedes have taken it away.....

--scott

snipped-for-privacy@panix.com (Scott Dorsey) wrote in news:it1bht$sb2$ snipped-for-privacy@panix2.panix.com:

That is the absolute truth.

Very strangely enough, the best guy I know of in my area works for one of the big chains.

And it IS necessary to rotate the tires for maximum tread-life. Front and rear tires experience different loads from each other, and thus front and rear tires tend to have most of their wear in different places from each other. If you rotate the tires, the tires stop wearing in the one place and start wearing in the other, helping to even-out the overall wear.

Especially true on front wheel drives. One outfit I worked with refused to do rotations, the Caravans they had would go through a set of front tires in about 30-40K while the rears would last over 100K !

Just about every 4X4 I've had was real bad about tire wear. Just because of the different loading. If you didn't rotate the tires you ended up with some real strange wear patterns.

Some tire brands and tread patterns are also problems. The set of Coopers on the wifes Jeep need rotation every 3K or they develop cupping across the tread behind each of the larger tread blocks. Those get cross rotation, balances them out nicely.

Horse hockey.

As would be expected with those wheels doing the acceleration, the steering and with weight tranfer to the during braking, they do most of the work.

Cupping is generally a result of an underdamped suspension and bouncing wheel.

Bottom line, perform regular preventive maintenance, monitor vehicle condition, replace bad parts, maintain correct alignment and forget about the ridiculous notion of tire rotation.

I know where ours is! ;)

indeed. it can also be crappy tires with unevenly tensioned and/or laid casing fibers.

"rotation" is a hangover from the days of bias ply, just like 3000 mile oil changes. to do so on a modern vehicle with radial tires is a ridiculous anachronism.

when tegger says "tires experience different loads from each other ... tend to have most of their wear in different places from each other", he's absolutely correct. and this is precisely why you /should not/ rotate. to put that wear into a different position of the vehicle means that suddenly you don't have 100% of the tread touching the road surface any more. anyone having trouble with this concept should chalk up some hdfb and drive different positioned then rotated tires across it to see for themselves. to retain maximum traction, braking, and thus control and safety, tires should NOT be rotated. as evidenced by performance vehicle manufacturers where traction and control are front and center.

What do you think of securing the breaker bar on the ground and simply driving backwards a few inches to break the nut?

it's going to drag or dig the breaker bar into the ground since it has to move laterally to track the spindle as the wheel turns - not safe because there's no control.

much safer to swing by a shop that has the tools. it'll maybe cost you a six-pack - much cheaper than a broken breaker bar or a dinged car.

better yet, buy the tools that will do the job. i got a 24" 3/4" drive breaker bar off craigslist for $25. that will shift most spindle nuts and even crank pulley bolts.

I think it might work if you use a pipe extension which would allow the bar to slide a little. Mostly, if you use a long enough extension it's not going to be a problem to break the nut by simply leaning on it. I've broken axle nuts by just jacking up the end of the breaker bar.

One time, I helped my neighbor remove the crankshaft pulley bolt from his Toyota by laying the end of the breaker bar on the ground and bumping the starter - after removing the cable to the coil, of course. One small bump and it was loose. I have no idea how he got that nut back on tightly enough. My guess is that he didn't. :-)

that is an old trick that works just fine. but the difference with the wheel spindle is the non-stationary vehicle. [you /definitely/ don't want to try this with just the gear train engaged.] vehicle movement is a safety issue even if it's just the socket coming off the nut. much more so if someone insists on trying to use a 1/2" breaker bar and it fails.

I'm not sure why vehicle movement would be a problem. The brakes and tires are all in place and it's not jacked up. How far back do I have to go? Less than 5" would be my guess.

I'll try to see if it works the next time I need to. That could be never. :-)

I agree, 1/2" ain't gonna cut it. I have seen big sockets with 1/2" drives. I wish they wouldn't sell stuff like that.