NoDelta

I have an `04 with 120k miles. I bought that car around 60k miles and starting tracking it around 80k miles. Probably 30-40 events total over the life of the car, usually on 200TW tires. No aero and never slicks.

I was a Palmer this weekend with the S2K Takeover club and had some problems with my lug nuts. I haven't heard of this before and wanted to check in with your collective experience. Here's what happened:
- Flashback to 2021 - I had lug nut that felt "stuck" on. It took a breaker bar to remove it. It didn't break loose and then turn easy, every turn required a breaker bar. I assumed the mechanic (a new guy 1 had never seen before, and haven't see since) had cross threaded it. I had been on Muteki steel lug nuts for around two months. I replaced all of the OEM front studs with ARPs, replaced the front bearings, and kept the Muteki lug nuts.
- Before this event I removed each wheel by hand to inspect brakes and suspension. I installed each lug nut by hand, tightened by hand, and torqued. The nuts were not cross threaded this time.
- This weekend I started experiencing a vibration on track. It was noticeable around 90mph and got worse when I hit the brakes. I think this was just used rubber building up on the tires on a hot day. I think it's irrelevent here, but maybe not?
- Because of the vibration, i decided to pull off the track. This was my third event on Ohlins and new bushings, so I wanted to pull wheels and give everything a once over to make sure I properly tightened everything/nothing came loose.
- While the car was hot, I jacked it up and tried to remove the front drivers wheel. 3 lugs came off easily. 1 was hard. 1 was totally stuck. We hit it with a milwakee impact gun and it barely moved.
- We let the car cool totally and tried again. All the lug nuts came off. The threads on the stuck bolt were totally shredded. Even with the car cool, 1-2 nuts on each corner were hard to remove. These threads were compromised (couldn't thread a new lug nut on by hand), but not shredded like the first corner.
- I reinstalled 19 lug nuts (all but the shredded one) and finished the day. Same vibrations as before, but I convinced myself they were from extra rubber on the wheels and kept going.

I`ve never seen an ARP stud totally fouled like that. I`m about to remove the front hubs (again), replace the front studs with ARP (again), replace the front bearings (again) and cross my fingers.
Has anybody experienced this before? Anything I can do differently this time around?
Right now the only change I`m planning to do is scrap all of my Muteki lug nuts and try something different.

noodels

Sure they are not alloy,as alloy with steel may have issues,also correct radius nuts for wheels will cause problems as they go oval.

NoDelta

The only info I can find on the muteki says they`re a steel alloy - That could mean a lot of different things. Based on the way it destroyed the ARP stud, it must have been as hard or harder.
I had the wheels off a couple days before the event to give everything a once over and all the lugs went on and off easy. It couldn't have been galling from the dissimilar metals in that short a time period.

What do you mean the correct radius nuts?
Everything is a 12x1.5 pitch.
The wheels are wedsport 105n. The seat where the the lug nut sits has a 60 degree taper. The muteki lug nuts have the same.

flanders

Studs seems to be 8740 chrome moly and those lug nuts 50BV30 which seems kind of similar but uses vanadium and boron instead of moly.
Are you using any kind of lube on the threads? Did you replace all of the lug nuts or just the damaged one?

noodels

Could they be Fake ones ?

flanders

Maybe not fake, but could be quality issues like bad heat treatment or something like that.
If you got another completely new set it seems less likely though.

NoDelta

When the first lug was damaged two years ago, i figured that if I was removing the hubs to replace a damage stud, I might as well replace stud on the front end with ARP. It was mid-covid and the extended studs were on backorder everywhere, so I used OEM length ARPs.
I needed to buy a new box of Muteki's to replace the damaged one. I believe that I left all of the original lug nuts on and just replaced the one that I needed.
I`ve never used any sort or lube/antisieve/chemicals on the lug nuts since it's garage stored and I don't have any concerns with corrosion.

Fakes are always a possibility - tough to say.
The muteki's were purchased on amazon. The ARPs were purchased through Summit Racing.

Fullsend

I hope I don’t run into the same issue. I just had ARP extended studs (purchased from Summit) installed and will be using Muteki lug nuts purchased from Amazon.

flanders

I would recommend going with aluminum lug nuts instead.
949 racing has really nice and affordable ones that are tough enough for an impact gun, not that I would recommend using one though.

NoDelta

Thanks Flanders - I`ll look into the 949