in these two pictures you can see the lugs up close and the washer that was mentioned earlier on in the thread. The only broken lugs are from the ones WITH the washer on my truck. The strange thing is that no other lugs/hubs were effected. I am probably going to just have them change all 16 lugs on the front of the truck for good measure. I drive cross country for vacations quite often and will be getting a fifth wheel to hit the road for a few years working as a traveling nurse so I dont need to have wheels flying off my truck with a fifth wheel on my ****....

 

Years ago my family owned a repair shop, eventually I owned it, hand me down family business, anyway, my grandfather and father always removed those assembly retainers when they did brake jobs or tire work. It was just kind of what you did. I guess they were on the right track. As far as anti-sieze, that stuff does not affect final torque, there have been many articles and studies throught the years that dispelled that myth/old wivestale.

If it were me, I would replace ALL of the lug studs, def all the front ones, and I would be considering the rear ones as well. Those that remained to hold the wheel on have probably been overstressed. Could be that they did get a batch that were defective and used during manufacturing, which brings all the rear ones into consideration as well. It used to be that with every new batch of incoming things like these from manufacturers they were routinely sampled and tensil strength tested, but I would imagine that extra effort went by the wayside in cost cutting measures.


CD

 

I had this happen to mine. I had new wheels put on drove 4 1/2 hours to st. louis and back, got home and happened to look at them and there was four missing on the front pass. side. When we pulled the wheel off two more crystalized and just fell off. They guys at home helping me with it have been in the tire business for over twenty years and they told me the lugs crystalize and just snap off when they are overtorqued.

 

I had teh same problem with my 98 several years ago. I bought it used in 02ish and it had just had aftermarket rims and tires put on it buy the used car dealer I bought it from. I drove it for 10 months before it happened. I was washing it one day before a road trip and I noticed a lug was missing on the front passanger side. I finished washing it and went to check stuff over and realized that 2 more where loose and one fell off in my fingers. I drove it 8 miles to the nearest shop and when we put it up on the hoist and went to remove the tire all but 2 studs where broke and they where side by side. That tire was abought ready to fall off. We wound up replaceing all the studs on the front end. I dont remember what it cost me but it wasent chea.

 

Keep in mind that all wheels (stock or otherwise) need to be retorqued after a few miles. If you've never done this, you will be surprised at how much they "loosened". They actually just need reseated.