Wheel flies off on freeway

[repacs0103]

Over torquing will not cause that- that is loose lugs for sure. Quite frankly Ive over torque every wheel I've ever installed- with a 1/2"-1" air gun every time at 130-200 psi, on thousands of wheels, and I've never snapped a stud- but I've lost 2 or 3 just like this from under torquing.

And because of this thread, I'm going to go put the gun on my 2017 eagle because it has about 1000 miles on it now and I haven't re-torqued yet.


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[Mopar_Earl]

Originally Posted by Marine71-76

We had a similar incident - we were crossing a bridge on I-70 in the middle of nowhere Utah. It was a floating bridge that caused our issue - going onto the bridge was fine but when we crossed back over, we lost the tire, hub, plus damage on the trailer and cut waterline & power to the rear of the unit. And yes I check the torque every 500 miles.

According to the State Police, it happens a lot on that bridge.

Loosing the hub would of been unrelated to the lug torque. That's a whole other issue. That would of meant the axle nut or spindle came off.


Earl

[Mopar_Earl]

Post a pic of the wheel lug openings. Do they have damage?


Earl

[norty1]

[QUOTE=norty1;539074.

Glad you did not have any trouble. BTW did you find the tire?[/QUOTE]

Did you find it?

[luvs2camp7164]

Lug nuts long gone with the tire. No other pics. The hub did not come off . All the studs broke flush with the hub. There were no signs of loose lug nuts, no vibration no shimmy. It towed smooth. When I punched the broken studs out of the hub I did not see any damage to the stud mounting holes in the hub, no cracks or wattage. The new studs punched back in smooth with no issues and seated tight in the hub.

[norty1]

Sounds like the lugs were over torqued to me. Sure hope the rest of them are verified cause the same person that did it likely did them all.

I had a hub cap come off my truck in NY state. It passed me and went over an overpass and into the woods. I did not even stop to look for it.

[luvs2camp7164]

That was my concern from the beginning. The dealer said they would be checking the other 3 hubs to make sure they are safe. They really seamed to be concerned about it and our safety. Been dealing with them for years and they have always taken great care of us. I am also having the tires upgraded while they have the wheels off. I planned on doing this anyway. I will be changing the Rainer tires to goodyear endurance for trailers, these are made in the USA. Any thoughts on that brand, the reviews seem to be good.

[norty1]

Make sure they know how to check for over torqueing because I don't know and if they are, do the studs have to be replaced?

[Isaacs]

Originally Posted by norty1

Make sure they know how to check for over torqueing because I don't know and if they are, do the studs have to be replaced?

I would request that all the studs be replaced.

[PonyExpress]

lug nut torque is a pet peeve of mine. I do my tire business with Discount tire and have for over 20 years.

They run down lug nuts with impact with torque stick. then put torque wrench on and click and go to the next. If the wrench clicks without and movement then all you know is that they are at least x ft pounds,. It could be way over.

properly done the lug nut should be turning when wrench clicks. No other way will be accurate.

But they don't want to listen to me so I just have to do it myself.

I had a flat fixed once at a small independent tire shop. Later I bought new tires at DT. the front left had 1 nut they just could not get off. 45 minutes later they finally got it off and destroyed the lug nut . Yes it was the one that the small shop did. Imagine if that tire had gone flat late at night, on the highway in the rain.

[Lady Fitzgerald]

Originally Posted by Isaacs

I would request that all the studs be replaced.

Though that would be a pain in the neck (and expensive if you if you have to pay to have that done), that wouldn't be a bad idea.

[Lady Fitzgerald]

Originally Posted by PonyExpress

lug nut torque is a pet peeve of mine. I do my tire business with Discount tire and have for over 20 years.

They run down lug nuts with impact with torque stick. then put torque wrench on and click and go to the next. If the wrench clicks without and movement then all you know is that they are at least x ft pounds,. It could be way over.

properly done the lug nut should be turning when wrench clicks. No other way will be accurate...

I agree that would be the most accurate way to do it. However, even though the torque sticks are not as accurate as a real torque wrench, they are far more accurate than anything else, especially a lug nut tightening a lug nut with an air wrench. Btw, I've never seen Discount Tire use anything other than an air wrench and a torque stick.

Originally Posted by PonyExpress

...I had a flat fixed once at a small independent tire shop. Later I bought new tires at DT. the front left had 1 nut they just could not get off. 45 minutes later they finally got it off and destroyed the lug nut . Yes it was the one that the small shop did. Imagine if that tire had gone flat late at night, on the highway in the rain.

I had something similar happen to me a couple of decades ago. I was on Woody Mountain Road, an unpaved road west of Flagstaff south of I-40 when I had a blowout on the little Ranger I had at the time. I could not loosen the lug nuts to save my life.

Fortunately, after a while, a knight in shining armor riding a white charger rode up to help me (ok, it was a redneck wearing and driving old beaters but I was still glad to see him). He had a better lug wrench than mine and big, bulging muscles. Still, even using both hands and one foot, he was only able to get three lug nuts off when he told me he was afraid he would break the remaining two studs off. I told him that, if he broke those two studs off, I could creep back to Flagstaff on the other three but, if those two remaining lug nuts didn't come off, I wasn't going anywhere. He managed to get them off and even put my spare on for me, then I drove to Discount Tire in Flagstaff and had both the flat and the opposite tire replaced (they weren't far from being due; I needed to wait for another paycheck before replacing the other two).

I asked the guy at Discount to check the torque on the lug nuts on the other axle because the one wheel had been over torqued. All he started to do was just take the torque stick attached air wrench to the lug nuts. I had to explain to him that each lug nut needed to backed off, then retorqued because they had been over torqued.

I went back to Sears to ream them out over torqueing the lug nuts when they had rotated my tires the week before. They just laughed it off as though it was no big deal.

Then there was time, when I was in college, my parents paid for new tires on the '51 Plymouth I had back then. I got a flat a couple of weeks later (you had to love those old tube type tires...not!). Those old MOPARs used lug bolts instead of lug nuts, which were more prone to seizing up. It took three men, one holding the lug wrench and two bouncing on a ten foot cheater pipe, to get the lug bolts loose. The next day, I took the car back to Goodyear, where the tires came from, got the flat repaired, and told them to break the lug bolts loose on the other three tires and hand tighten them.

[luvs2camp7164]

Update to the tire issue. Picked the unit up today from the dealer. The dealer and jayco came thru and covered everything under warranty, I was impressed. New hub, bearings, lug nuts, tire and rim. We did have them upgrade to the goodyear endurance tires while it was in the shop. Not a big fan of the Rainer tires.
All is good and on the road again!

[Mopar_Earl]

Originally Posted by luvs2camp7164

Update to the tire issue. Picked the unit up today from the dealer. The dealer and jayco came thru and covered everything under warranty, I was impressed. New hub, bearings, lug nuts, tire and rim. We did have them upgrade to the goodyear endurance tires while it was in the shop. Not a big fan of the Rainer tires.
All is good and on the road again!

What did they caused the failure?


Earl

[luvs2camp7164]

Nobody would fess up to it but the dealer said they would take care of it and they did. We had less than 500 miles on the unit. When we picked it up I thanked the dealer for standing up for us, he told me they had the same thing happen to a pinacel unit a week later, units were built a couple weeks apart. They had a lot of damage to the side of their trailer when it cut loose. We were fortunate and had no trailer damage. I am not sure what happened but as I stated earlier in the post I have been working on small cars to 24 foot straight trucks for many years and from my experience it shows signs of over tightening because they all broke flush. At this time i am pleased with the dealer and jayco, thats why i buy jayco products. We are very greatfull that we did not have an accident or cause one. I wish i had more relevent information to report to other jayco owners but it is a mechanical system and can fail like everything else.

[Mopar_Earl]

Thanks for the update! Glad you ditched the china bomb tires. My unit came with the endurance tires. I have high hopes for them. Time will tell if they are a good tire or not. After (4) blow outs with China tires with one doing damage, I will never allow one on anything. That was on my previous trailer.


Earl

[luvs2camp7164]

I agree, after reading posts and reviewing the brand I knew I was changing them out. I decided to let the dealer do it while it was in the shop for repairs anyway. I believe jayco has switched to the goodyear on all their units now.
On another note was that you who picked up a 293rkds in another post? If so how do you like it. The wife and I really like ours, great floor plan for the 2 of us.

[Mopar_Earl]

Yes I Have a 2017 Eagle 293RKDS. We took delivery April 26th. Ordered it January 26th, came off the line March 10th. We love it. No major issues yet. I have been doing mods/upgrades. We just recently got an Onan generator for it. Working on installing that.


Earl

[luvs2camp7164]

We picked ours up in June 2016. When we ordered it we thought it would be a 16. When the dealer placed the order jayco informed us that it would be a 17, they were switching years on the next run. I am glad because we like the colors better and the pocket door in the bathroom.
Where do you plan to mount the generator?

[Mopar_Earl]

We ordered the trailer with the dry camping package (gen prep). So in the front bay is where the genset compartment is.

We also like the Eagle Silver color over the tan on the earlier years. We ordered it with Cashmere decor.


Earl