If Your Vehicle Suddenly Starts to Pull to the Left

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dibbons

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La Paz, B.C.S., Mexico
Check your tires. I noticed on the 10 mile ride home today in our back-up/spare vehicle ('92 Jeep Cherokee) that it was noticeably pulling to the side. I could not remember hitting any potholes and just figured it was the fault of the bald tires.

Later, I was watering in the yard and took a glance into the carport to find the left front tire almost sitting on the rim. Took the tire a mile down the street to have it repaired. I could not break the lug nuts loose with my star wrench. Used a breaker bar and the nuts were making that high-pitched squeal for the first turn or two. I'm afraid to oil wheel studs, so I just had to grin and bear the chalk screeching on the blackboard noises for a short spell.

At the tire shop, the guy dunked the flat in a tub of water, marked the spot, then tried to remove the three fasteners attaching the plastic center piece with a pair of pliers. Nothing doing. He went looking for a tool to fit (maybe 5/16"?) but came back with nothing and started over with the pliers.

I took the mini-socket sets from behind the seat of my '96 Dodge Dakota (one SAE and one metric) and set them down beside him. It didn't take him but a millisecond to figure out where to find what he needed after that. He broke the tire down and patched the inside.

The tire has little/no tread and is maybe 15-20 years old. I try to keep speeds down below 50 mph and never drive this vehicle out of town because obviously you can't trust old worn tires like that. (Recently spent over $1,000 on two new sets of Michelins for our two daily drivers and I feel good about that).

When the guy threw the tire into the bed of my pick-up, I noticed the valve stem cap was missing. After I pointed that out, he brought one over and screwed it on. He tried to charge me 60 Mexican pesos which is about $2.50 USD but generous as I am, I gave him 100 pesos (about $4.25 USD). Of course, in the good old USA I probably could not even find a tire shop at any price that would have been willing to repair a tire like that.

tire 2.JPG


tire 1.JPG
 
Riding on old worn out tires makes no sense at all. I dont care what speed you drive.

It’s just a bad idea.

A suddenly required maneuver in an emergency situation at even just 30 mph and a tire fails can become a fatality.

Think.
 
Anti seize your lug studs and nut seats.
No. Light oil or motor oil.
Grease/anti-sieze will cause galling between nut and seat. Also the designed torque is dry torque. Using grease or anti-sieze can cause the wheel studs to stretch.

Guy greased the wheel nuts then pounded the lug nuts on with an impact. A week later it came back for the remainder of the work. 6 foot pipe with my near 200 lbs on the end of it,had to bounce on it, they moved with a bang! Told him if he ever did that again i would fill his toolbox with grease.
 
I have been using anti-seize since I first heard of the stuff, decades and decades ago. It goes on the threads not on the conical seats.
But I torque my own wheelnuts, the old-fashioned way; using common sense. After 5 decades of torqinchit, my muscles are very finely graduated,lol, and in in tune with what the threads are feeding back to me.
 
If your vehicle pulls to the left, stop lettin the fat women drive it.
 
See all those small cracks in the tread of that tire? Holy macaroni, Batman....Those tires are finished! I push the limits but I'd dump those before driving anywhere.
 
Check your tires. I noticed on the 10 mile ride home today in our back-up/spare vehicle ('92 Jeep Cherokee) that it was noticeably pulling to the side. I could not remember hitting any potholes and just figured it was the fault of the bald tires.

Later, I was watering in the yard and took a glance into the carport to find the left front tire almost sitting on the rim. Took the tire a mile down the street to have it repaired. I could not break the lug nuts loose with my star wrench. Used a breaker bar and the nuts were making that high-pitched squeal for the first turn or two. I'm afraid to oil wheel studs, so I just had to grin and bear the chalk screeching on the blackboard noises for a short spell.

At the tire shop, the guy dunked the flat in a tub of water, marked the spot, then tried to remove the three fasteners attaching the plastic center piece with a pair of pliers. Nothing doing. He went looking for a tool to fit (maybe 5/16"?) but came back with nothing and started over with the pliers.

I took the mini-socket sets from behind the seat of my '96 Dodge Dakota (one SAE and one metric) and set them down beside him. It didn't take him but a millisecond to figure out where to find what he needed after that. He broke the tire down and patched the inside.

The tire has little/no tread and is maybe 15-20 years old. I try to keep speeds down below 50 mph and never drive this vehicle out of town because obviously you can't trust old worn tires like that. (Recently spent over $1,000 on two new sets of Michelins for our two daily drivers and I feel good about that).

When the guy threw the tire into the bed of my pick-up, I noticed the valve stem cap was missing. After I pointed that out, he brought one over and screwed it on. He tried to charge me 60 Mexican pesos which is about $2.50 USD but generous as I am, I gave him 100 pesos (about $4.25 USD). Of course, in the good old USA I probably could not even find a tire shop at any price that would have been willing to repair a tire like that.

View attachment 1715533339

View attachment 1715533340

I agree with KernDog. Michelin tires are good. Too good. The actual tire caucus outlasts the tire itself. They almost always separate and or blow out before the tread wears out. Look at the cracks. That's a telltale sign that separation is not far off, if it hasn't already happened.
 
I cannot agree here. It's the two beveled surfaces that keep the lug nuts tight. Anti Seize won't hurt a thing.
In the hands of an experienced user, but you can grossly overtighten wheel nuts with the anti-sieze applied. Any mention in service manuals of any lubricant on any wheel nuts is light oil or motor oil.
 
man that tire needed to be replaces 10 years ago...lol. and yea i doubt you would find any shop in the states that would fix that pile of ****.
 
Its interesting when on vacation, nassau was a perfect example, tires so smooth you would think they are slicks. Could hear the worn out brakes, and u-joints.
Even in florida, baldass tires was not uncommon.
But even here in manitoba, its amazing how many cars i see with bad tires, and low pressure, almost flat. Even myself, had a low tire, looked a little low,whe i checked it , 4 psi. Was still holding my truck up.
 
No. Light oil or motor oil.
Grease/anti-sieze will cause galling between nut and seat. Also the designed torque is dry torque. Using grease or anti-sieze can cause the wheel studs to stretch.

Guy greased the wheel nuts then pounded the lug nuts on with an impact. A week later it came back for the remainder of the work. 6 foot pipe with my near 200 lbs on the end of it,had to bounce on it, they moved with a bang! Told him if he ever did that again i would fill his toolbox with grease.

Yes, surely it was the grease that made the lug nuts impossible to remove, and not use of an impact.

Next time I pull a wheel, I'll photograph the seat. I've been doing it twenty years, and have yet to gall one unless I don't use antiseize, steel or aluminum.

And when I torque my lugnuts, I let common sense override my fear of a wheel coming off, and use the low end of the torque spec. Fact is, the spec is for a lubricated fastener. Running lug threads dry is far more dangerous than changing the TYPE of lube. Dry vs. oiled is something like 40% difference in tightening torque, oil vs. grease has a lot of variables but the max is more like 10% difference in torque, which is well within the factor of safety for lug studs and probably well within the accuracy of beat click type torque wrenches that have not been calibrated in years.

All of which are better than the impact gun most shops use, often without torque sticks or educated operators.
 
Its interesting when on vacation, nassau was a perfect example, tires so smooth you would think they are slicks. Could hear the worn out brakes, and u-joints.
Even in florida, baldass tires was not uncommon.
But even here in manitoba, its amazing how many cars i see with bad tires, and low pressure, almost flat. Even myself, had a low tire, looked a little low,whe i checked it , 4 psi. Was still holding my truck up.

Not long ago I was riding in a shuttle bus to the Phoenix airport.
A pickup towing what looked like a 6 horse trailer with a Woman driving passed us in the 4 lane section of I17 just a bit before the airport.
As she passed the bus I noticed her right rear tire was super low, and as she pulled in front of us into the lane we were in, her truck washed out jackknifed and flipped over sliding down the freeway.
 
Yes, surely it was the grease that made the lug nuts impossible to remove, and not use of an impact.

Next time I pull a wheel, I'll photograph the seat. I've been doing it twenty years, and have yet to gall one unless I don't use antiseize, steel or aluminum.

And when I torque my lugnuts, I let common sense override my fear of a wheel coming off, and use the low end of the torque spec. Fact is, the spec is for a lubricated fastener. Running lug threads dry is far more dangerous than changing the TYPE of lube. Dry vs. oiled is something like 40% difference in tightening torque, oil vs. grease has a lot of variables but the max is more like 10% difference in torque, which is well within the factor of safety for lug studs and probably well within the accuracy of beat click type torque wrenches that have not been calibrated in years.

All of which are better than the impact gun most shops use, often without torque sticks or educated operators.
Torque sticks are garbage, with a high quality impact on max,the torque sticks beat the snot out of the lug nuts.
Most torque wrenches are good for 1,000 clicks. Then need calibrating. i have 2, the recently calibrated one i use to check the more frequently used one.

Sorry, this is off topic,or is it?
35 years in the business, i have seen more than your avereage person. Some pretty stuck wheel nuts. For your average human, when it comes to wheel nuts, tighter is better!
 
I put lug nuts on under the assumption I'm going to have to remove them somewhere along the road. I've used a little dab of anti seize on the threads for years and never had a problem.

Anytime I buy new tires I have the shop torque the nuts, not run the impact wrench until all the air in the compressor is gone!!

And, I agree, Michelin tires are too damn good. I had a set with plenty of tread at 92,000 miles. But the rubber was getting hard and cracking.
 
In the hands of an experienced user, but you can grossly overtighten wheel nuts with the anti-sieze applied. Any mention in service manuals of any lubricant on any wheel nuts is light oil or motor oil.

Now THAT I can agree with.
 
Torque sticks are garbage, with a high quality impact on max,the torque sticks beat the snot out of the lug nuts.
Most torque wrenches are good for 1,000 clicks. Then need calibrating. i have 2, the recently calibrated one i use to check the more frequently used one.

Sorry, this is off topic,or is it?
35 years in the business, i have seen more than your avereage person. Some pretty stuck wheel nuts. For your average human, when it comes to wheel nuts, tighter is better!

I know you bees right. Torque sticks are a marketing ploy for tire shops to show ignorant customers that "they care" so they can go right ahead and act like their crew is a NASCAR team on your vehicle.........and tear **** up anyway.
 
My impact can be turned down, #1 is just shy of 100 ft-lbs if i let it pound away. I run em up and hand torque every single wheel nut.
 
I'm the point in life where I use a beam torque wrench for everything. I rarely use a impact at all, but that's more of a personal choice. I ain't against it, but I ain't flat rate either
 
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