I was torquing lug nuts wrong for years until a customer's wheel almost came off

I always did the star pattern by hand and then used the impact to finish, thinking it was fine. The other day, a guy came in with a loose wheel after I did his rotation, and I realized the impact was pulling the first nuts way too tight before the others were set. Has anyone else switched to a torque stick or just a final torque wrench check for every single wheel?

3 comments

3 Comments

patel.daniel2mo ago

Seriously? The star pattern is the whole point, it's not just for hand tightening. You're supposed to run the impact in the star pattern too, not just go around in a circle. A torque stick is a decent backup, but if you're skipping the cross pattern with the gun, you're doing it wrong from the start. That's why the wheel got pulled over. Just do the full star sequence with the impact at a lower setting, then maybe check a couple with a wrench if you're paranoid.

gavin_allen482mo ago

Yeah @patel.daniel is spot on. I warped a rotor once by just going in a circle with the gun. Now I always do the star pattern with it on a lower setting first, no issues since.

evanr792d ago

Read a thing from a guy who builds race cars once, he said the star pattern matters because it seats the wheel evenly against the hub before you clamp down hard. If you just fire the gun in a circle, you're basically bending the wheel or rotor a tiny bit on each lug, and it stacks up. I've been doing it his way for a couple years now, low setting in the star pattern then a final pass with a breaker bar and torque wrench, and I haven't had a wheel issue since.