<VV> Concentric wheel spacer necessary?

Thu Nov 30 22:13:51 EST 2017

The tapered seat wheels in the US still clamp the surfaces together but fewer of them since they have twice the nuts.  They are called lug center or BUDD style.
https://www.google.com/url?sa=i&rct=j&q=&esrc=s&source=images&cd=&cad=rja&uact=8&ved=0ahUKEwjC08HK6-fXAhXLxYMKHQVNAzgQjRwIBw&url=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.autoamenity.com%2FFAQ%2FDual-Wheel-Lug-Nuts.htm&psig=AOvVaw1Lnl20Ept6tTDrTumy5-CI&ust=1512184283077728

Joel McGregor

-----Original Message-----
From: Hugo Miller [mailto:Hugo at aruncoaches.co.uk] 
Sent: Wednesday, November 29, 2017 1:15 AM
To: Joel McGregor <joel at joelsplace.com>; Virtualvairs at corvair.org
Subject: Re: <VV> Concentric wheel spacer necessary?

#### That is amazing! The UK government has commissioned university studies to try to find the cause of "wheel loss syndrome" and they're still scratching their heads about it - and you've just summed it up in one neat sentence. The back wheels of my coaches have EIGHT surfaces all clamped together with one set of lug nuts (you have the outside face of the hub flange; two faces on the brake drum; two faces of a spacer they have fitted for some reason; two faces of the inner wheel; one face of the outer wheel). 
If you have .010" of rust, dirt or worse still, paint, on each of those surfaces, you end up with almost a tenth of an inch gap, once the constant heating & cooling, braking and acceleration have taken their toll & rubbed it all off. No wonder they fall off!
    My solution is to thoroughly clean all the faces, and to spray them with cavity wax rust preventative or similar (this is the UK where we use a lot of salt on the roads), and to grease the studs. Then I fit Ric-clips to make sure the nuts don't come loose (they're a figure-of-eight spring clip in case they don't exist in the States - equivalent to Zafety-lug clips or whatever they're called). I never use a torque wrench - just do them up by feel. Never had a problem.
    The reason this was never a problem with the old-style fixings is that the wheels were located by cones on the studs and on the nuts, and weren't in contact with anything else.
    That system you describe, with the square end on the stud or whatever it is, I've seen that on American trucks, but it does not exist in the UK. 
British coaches have 1+5/16" lug nuts, only we have to call them 33mm now. 
European commercials, on the other hand, have 32mm nuts!
    One thing that does concern me is that I've watched the tire fitters in the US truck stops do the lug nuts up (dry) with an air gun, then just let the jack down & drive off. I like to feel the nuts going up.
    As an aside, I  recently bought an old car as a runabout for a friend here in the UK. It was advertised as having a collapsed wheel bearing, which had been diagnosed by the AA (=AAA). I drove it back & I thought it sounded like the wheel nuts were loose, but I didn't have a jack to test them, or a lever to pry the wheel trim off. I drove it about thirty miles home and sure enough, when I popped the wheel trim off, the nuts were all loose! Nothing else wrong with it! It had damaged the holes in the wheel, but the studs were still ok - just a slight mark on them.
    The reason I tell this story is to illustrate just how much it takes for a wheel to fall off a car. I reckon I could have done another hundred miles before they fell off.

-----Original Message-----
From: Joel McGregor via VirtualVairs
Sent: Wednesday, November 29, 2017 4:05 AM
To: Virtualvairs at corvair.org
Subject: Re:  Concentric wheel spacer necessary?

I read up on the wheels falling off and it's a problem with too many surfaces being clamped together.  Note that the front single wheels don't fall off.
You've got the hub surface then the brake drum and then 2 wheels that all have to be clamped together.  Any rust, dirt, paint or whatever on that many surfaces is too compressible to overcome with the maximum clamping force of the studs.  They are fine if you re torque after the recommended 150 miles. 
The previous lug piloted system used a nut for each wheel instead of one for the pair so they had one less pair of mating surfaces to clamp but twice as many nuts to torque.  My truck has the old system and torqueing 20 on each dual is a real beating.  That system also uses 4 different lug nuts.  As Hugo mentioned they are LH thread on the left side and RH on the right.  The front and rear outers are 1-1/8"  The rear inners are much smaller  IIRC 3/4.  The nuts for the inner are the studs for the outer hence the size difference.
Joel McGregor

-----Original Message-----
From: Hugo Miller [mailto:Hugo at aruncoaches.co.uk]
Sent: Tuesday, November 28, 2017 2:34 AM
To: Joel McGregor <joel at joelsplace.com>; Virtualvairs at corvair.org
Subject: Re: <VV> Concentric wheel spacer necessary?

#### I've owned & operated large buses & coaches in the UK all my life. The old British coaches, as with all cars of that era, had conical lug nuts & countersunk holes in the wheels. The wheels were located solely by the studs & nuts. They also had left-hand threads on the left side of the vehicle.
Then they changed to the European system of having a register on the hub to locate the wheel, and flat lug nuts. Right-hand threads all round. Now we have a thing called "Wheel-loss syndrome" where the twin wheels on the left rear keep falling off. That's progress, I guess, - if it ain't broke, fix it till it is.

-----Original Message-----
From: Joel McGregor via VirtualVairs
Sent: Tuesday, November 28, 2017 5:43 AM
To: 'Virtualvairs at corvair.org'
Subject: Re:  Concentric wheel spacer necessary?

Big trucks use either hub centered or stud centered on disk wheels but not both.  They carry a lot of weight so I'm guessing that using normal Corvair studs and tapered seats is more than good enough.
When I bought my '64 Spyder I ran it pretty had before really looking it over and it had a nut missing on a rear wheel.  3 held it together fine so I'm thinking 4 is plenty.

Joel McGregor

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