What's your opinion.
I hate chrome plated aftermarket lugs that cost less than the price of chrome plating. i.e clearly sourced from a nation where there are no govt standards on bolt manufacturing. Also, you cannot chrome plate hardened steel. Grade 8 and above i think.

Good steel is the best insurance against rounded and eventually stripped bolts. And rust.

But these are soft aluminum. So anti-seize the threads? One thing is that they wont rust, second insurance against frozen bolts.

 

A good aluminum billet is more than strong enough, and I personally use anti-seize on all my lugs, steel or not. 6061 billet is probably the most common high strength alloy, especially when heat treated, and would undoubtedly be more than sufficient with the proper nut design for the specific wheels.
Besides all that, 12-point nuts look COOL.
You will certainly be advised to have the correct 12-point socket/wrench very handy for tire/wheel related situations.
PLUS: it'd be a wonder anti-theft device.

 

Thank you sincerely on all counts.
Not easy getting qualified answers in the world anymore.
I figured if you guys had the infinite wisdom of putting an air base next to one of worlds largest bird sanctuaries, you must know something.

Will order a set this week. Been searching for 2 years for the right lugs.
Did you see the size that fits our car?
Thanks

p.s 12point should afford more torque right?

 

So, I had intended starting a new thread but this one seems to be appropriate:

After being out of town for a few weeks, with my XK in the garage, the tire on my front right Senta wheel was flat (and low on tread) so I decided to fit the spare and get new fronts. Rash decision.

To sum up, after three hours work I have two nuts off, one cover still spinning on a nut (all the others did likewise) and two nuts showing with their covers now removed.

The two nuts will not budge. Flattened the edges of the correct-size regular 12-point socket so went to a six-sided snug-fit socket. The leverage/impact that I provided failed to move the nut but has broken the socket.

Now I'm in a quandary as to my next step:
Leverage appears to be useless.
Tried an impact driver with the original socket but that didn't gain any ground.
Have used liberal amounts of WD40 and am leaving overnight in the vain hope that this will help.
When the WD40 doesn't help, what have others tried?
I would use a blowtorch, or oxy-acetylene to heat the nuts (did this in the long-distant past, with steel wheels) but am concerned about potential damage to a painted alloy wheel.

Any other suggestions?

Didn't ever have this problem with the XK8 - was I just fortunate?

 

Feel terrible for you mate. First things first, lets order the nuts I posted above.

If you can get covers off, try this:
In a needle dispensing bottle, mix 50% acetone and 50% transmission fluid.
Apply that instead of the WD40 which has very limited penetration.
Did you break an impact grade socket?

Posting couple of videos for you that will make you a believer
The dispensing bottle

 

Forgot to mention, the reason for the needle applicator is to use very small amounts and have plenty of rags and cleaning solution to immediately wipe off any run-off. You know it will harm the finish.

here is another video- you can jump to the end and save yourself the hillbilly details

 

Yea WD40 alone won't do it. PB blaster is good, if you can get it into the threads. When it happened to me, I was able to fill the tire and drive the 2 miles to the tire shop and they extracted the stripped inner nut with a special impact tool that is similar to this:
CTA 13/16 in. emergency lug remover A147 - Read 1 Reviews on CTA #A147

Can you get enough air in the tire to get to a tire shop? Do you have AAA? If not, buy it! Or visit the auto parts store or tire store and get that tool that will fit the lug (bring one you got off to fit it).

And yea, order new lug nuts from one of the sources in this thread and a new lug wrench now.

 

Yikes, this sounds like what I went through with my XKR--except I was paying a shop to do all this. It cost me $2,000+ to get a new wheel and hub.

 

looks like they are no longer available and not on back order either

 

These are the same also according to the dimensions in the listing. Same seller too:
20pc OE Mag Style Lug Nuts with Washer | 12x1.5 | for Stock Mitsubishi (Silver) | eBay

 

Stuart[/QUOTE]
After removing one OEM lug nut and reinstalling it using the factory supplied tools and my torque wrench (92 ft.-lbs.), I concluded that it's not worth buying one piece Gorilla lug nuts. All of my OEM lug nuts are in good shape because I never let a wheel tech use an impact wrench to remove or reinstall those lug nuts; hand tools only. I suspect that the primary cause of damage to OEM lug nuts is the use of impact wrenches.
Stuart[/QUOTE]



Sorry but its not a impact wrench but idiots that grab the wrong socket and spin it before they realize its the wrong size damaging the lug nut. I only use factory OEM on my 3 Jags and literally I remove and reinstall 1000's of OEM lug nut every yr for the past 20 years and never have had a issue. I use a Impact wrench every time and torque stick on install. FAKE NEWS LOL

 

So - have ordered the suggested nuts and removed the offending wheel (FR). The latter was performed by means of a Craftsman Lug Nut removal set. Hammered the remover onto each nut and when supplied with ~200 ftlbs they unthreaded! For FL wheel all came off with a regular socket.
Checked the rears this evening, RL two came off easily, RR only one; some would not accept a 19mm socket and are obviously distorted. So, my weekend is mapped out - extract 7 spinning covers then undo or hammer out 7 nuts!

 

if you hammer the 3/4" socket over the nut it will reform the cover and not only usually come off but be almost good as new

 

Thanks Brutal - wish your theory had worked for me Anyway, for all but one of the remaining nuts, hammering an 18mm socket over the nut enabled the cover to be twisted off. The 11/16" Craftsman Lug Nut Extractor then ate into and twisted off the nuts, again, all required about 200 ft lbs to remove.

The final nut? The cover would not release so used the extractor over the cover, time and time again with no unsticking occurring. Once the nut was reduced in size, a hole cutter, drills and chisel enabled me to remove it!! (See photo)

Alongside is one of the new Solid nuts - a perfect fit with larger head and sunk further into the wheel. Thanks so much to those who proffered these as a solution to the OEM disasters

 

I guess you were lucky. Although I never thought about it as part of my annual process of getting the car ready for driving season I remove and clean and reinstall all of my wheels. I torque at 95 Lb-ft and haven't had a problem yet. Something to consider on a yearly bases. Also if a dealer or tire shop has to remove a wheel I will loosen and re-torque the nuts.

 

Anti-Seize! A little dab on the shank and washer also helps, especially for those in humid-salty areas.

 

While it may be of little help now to Nigel, for others who may find themselves in this predicament. Using a 3/4" socket to hammer into form the cover absolutely worked in my case. Just make sure you use some anti-size inside the socket or you will spend an even greater time getting the socket off.

 

Thread Bump!
Seems like lots of people are asking about nuts lately.
A couple, anyway.

 

Mine have been wrecked by the company putting on new tires. All wheels were OK except for the 5 on the rear passenger side which seemed to have been torqued to infinity. Sometimes you can'd do the job yourself and you leave it to some guy who thinks "I have a 1000 ft lbs impact wrench, I'll use it". When they are over torqued the metal cap is useless as a way to get some bite on the nut. If you look up this problem you'll find many cases of this problem on all cars not just Jags.

 

I was replacing my pads and rotors on my 2007 XK (BTW the car has only done 22K and new rotors. Really.) got one rear wheel done and moved on to the other side. I could not get three lug nuts off and the casing was slipping over the internal nut. The standard fix for this , it seemed, was to remove the casing and expose the 18mm nut beneath, which seemed logical. So after hours of getting the covers off all three lugs I used an 18mm socket and a 2 ft breaker bar. Two finally came off but the third was on so tight I rounded the nut. Now I was in a pickle. I tried everything, hammering on a smaller 12 point socket, impact wrench, 5 ft cheater bar. Nothing would move this. Read more on the subject and came across the Irwin Lug Nut Remover. Watched some videos and went to buy some. Napa and Advanced did not have the right size but an American Company, Rocket Socket made with American Steel, sells a whole set. I used one on the stubborn nut and two minutes later it was off with the 2 ft breaker bar. Amazing. I know GGG thinks were all crazy with these nuts but sometimes it's the garage that causes the problem. Some enthusiasts change brake fluid twice a year and the repeated torquing of the nut causes it to fail. So finally all my lug nuts are now off and I am replacing them with Mag style lugs from Amazon. In the photo attached, the one at the end is the removed lug nut with the Rocket Socket still on (They are hard to remove from the extracted lug nut sometimes), Next in the middle is the standard Jag lug nut and last is the new nut showing the 12X1.5 thread size. The RocketSocket set was $69, the new nuts $21 for 20. Details of what the new nuts fits in Jag world are in the other photo. They look shorter than the Jag original but remember that the top part of the Jag lug nut is hollow, the new ones are solid chromed steel. One last couple of things, if I'd known about the extractor earlier I think I could have got the nuts off without stripping off the cover and you should make sure that the new nut goes on easily in case the bolts was stretched by the over torquing. You will need to have a 21mm socket or 13/16 in your trunk because these bolts are bigger and a wrench. The standard issue Jag lug nut tool is soft as hell and isn't worth having any how because it's too short.

Graham