Date:         Wed, 28 Dec 2005 17:06:59 -0800
Reply-To:     Robert Fisher <refisher@MCHSI.COM>
Sender:       Vanagon Mailing List <vanagon@gerry.vanagon.com>
From:         Robert Fisher <refisher@MCHSI.COM>
Subject:      The Return of the Lug Nut
Content-Type: text/plain; charset="iso-8859-1"

Re: the earlier thread on the life expectancy of lug nuts, damage to same, etc; I got new tires for the beast for Xmas (more on them later; also, it occurs to me that you've 'attained' a new level of Vgon ownership when your high-dollar Xmas present is something expensive for your van. I know that this is old hat for many of you but it's a new one for me).

Anyway, when I pulled the wheels I of course checked out the lugs and bolts and this is what I saw:

http://home.mchsi.com/~robertandholly/vanagon/more_thingies.jpg
http://home.mchsi.com/~robertandholly/vanagon/thingies.jpg

The bolts look just fine, but at least four of the nuts are toast. (Sorry about the blurred pic of the bolts- had to get the wife to adjust 'our' camera : )  ) I checked all five wheels (stock steel 14s) and the seats look fine- no corresponding damage to be found. If these are the original bolts/nuts, they have about 340K miles on them. You can't see it in the pic, but one of the nuts actually has a fair crack running through it.

I was trying to find the specs of each item in the archives and haven't found them yet, which is odd because I'm quite sure that Chris posts the numbers at least every other week. I know at least two list vendors have them but I was going to get them locally if I could find the specs. (What are they?)

I'm going to replace all of 'em for GP. I was thinking of putting studs in the rotors- Can anybody with the experience / know how shed some light on that for me? Any opinions as to whether I should have the seats in the wheels ground / re-surfaced, or should I leave well enough alone? Anybody ever had this done?

TIA,
Robert