Lug Nuts oddly sized

[sbarron]

I can remember when cars had metric hardware on the body and standard on the mechanical. Also old Dodges used to have left hand thread lug nuts on the drivers side.

 

[gustheram]

just a silly question, but there wasn't any corrosion, dirt, etc... on the bad ones?

Nope, everything was pretty clean. A little brake dust but that's about it.

 

[Rustycowl69]

I can remember when cars had metric hardware on the body and standard on the mechanical. Also old Dodges used to have left hand thread lug nuts on the drivers side.

you must be as old as me, and that's older than dirt. They haven't used LH threaded lugnuts since the early 70's. Can anybody tell me how you know it's LH thread?

 

[sbarron]

You mean other than someone like me who's also older than dirt?

Disclaimer: I'm old, but not THAT old. I've just owned older Chrysler/Plymouth/Dodge.

 

[gustheram]

You screw them on with your left hand? lol I have no idea, I've never seen LH threaded lug nuts.

 

[GoldDot]

Did they not change in 2012 or 13 from 9/16"x18, 7/8" to 14mmx1.5, 22mm?

You are correct 2012 the thread went to 14mmx1.5 from the previous 9/16".

The metric lugs are stamped with a M.

The lug socket size stayed the same. They measure 22mm/.867" by caliper.

m stamp

Comparison between 2012 stock lugs and gorilla brand replacements.

One piece, solid steel, fully threaded Metric gorilla lug for 2012+



Stock lug side pic

 

[sbarron]

Left hand studs are stamped with "L" on the end. The nuts are likewise stamped on the side, (remember these are old school open lugs)


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[Rustycowl69]

of course, the easiest way is that many lug nuts had an "L" stamped on the side of the chrome lugnuts, or stamped into the outside end of the plain lugnuts. Some studs had a stamped "L" or "LH" in the outside end of the wheel studs.
But what I was really looking for is if you take your left hand, and form it into a fist, with your thumb sticking out (like you were making the thumbs-up gesture), if you point your thumb in the direction you wish the fastener (lugnut) to travel, the fingers on your left hand (fist) will show you the correct rotation to move the fastener to achieve that movement. Conversely, you can do the same thing with your right hand for RH threads. Hence, the name for RH threads.
Bonus. This also works for propellers!

 

[Rustycowl69]

Bonus Question: so, why did the old Mopars have LH wheel studs and lug nuts on the left side of their vehicles?
Hint: It has something to do with a different Right Hand Rule.

 

[sbarron]

http://www.moparmax.com/columns/magnante/v_5-2.html


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[gustheram]

:::MoparMax::: Steve Mags Speaks - The Mystery of Left-Hand Lug Nuts - 05/03/10


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Interesting read! Thanks for sharing. That's what I love about this forum. A fairly straightforward question about crappy lug nuts turned into a 3 page discussion with lots of useful and interesting information. Keep up the good work everyone.

 

[Boudreaux]

Kinda off topic but we used to have a 91 f350 that had left hand threads on the left side. My 51 is the same way. I always assumed it had to do with tire rotation

 

[Rustycowl69]

those answers are close and certainly entertaining, but it has to do with a somewhat obscure Physics Law. There is a force on a spinning axle, whose direction is determined by the Right Hand Rule. If you use the fingers of your right hand to curl in the direction of rotation of a spinning shaft, the direction of the right thumb will show the axial thrust force. So the lug nuts on the right side of a vehicle, when the vehicle is moving forward, have an axial force toward the center of the car (tightening, if you will), whereas the lug nuts on the left side of the car experience an axial force away from the center of the car (loosening, if you will). In real life, the axial forces are relatively small in relation to the clamping forces of properly torqued lugnuts. So Chryslers were over engineered until the early 70's.

 

[chris1965]

Yeah rusty- them Mitsubishi yard care trucks have still the left and right thread- fount that out the hard way...
but IMO it's not really that necessary, because you have to see, that the bolts are off center of the rotating axle. this means, the force to the lug nut is a lot lower and does not make a difference anymore. if you have a bolt directly on the axle, like the visco fan for example, then it makes sense. that 's the reason, why the thread is always against turning direction of the axle.

 

[Rustycowl69]

absolutely. Well put. I never said it was necessary. It was total overkill by Chrysler, maybe that why I am such a Chrysler fan. That's kind of the way I operate, too. LoL

 

[gustheram]

So obviously this thread is very old now. But as an update, I finally went ahead and put some Mcgard Tough Nuts on. After 4 rotations, new tires and 4 wheel repairs (tire installer messed up my rims), the factory lug nuts were so completely screwed that I had to drive a socket onto one to get it off, over half of them had to be driven back out of the socket, and one only came out of the socket after being soaked in PB Blaster and completely smashed out. Don't know why Ram decided to save a few bucks per truck and use the absolute crappiest lug nuts I've ever seen on any vehicle I've ever had the tires off of but in the end they really just annoyed the crap out of me and cost me an extra $75.

 

[gustheram]

So obviously this thread is very old now. But as an update, I finally went ahead and put some Mcgard Tough Nuts on. After 4 rotations, new tires and 4 wheel repairs (tire installer messed up my rims), the factory lug nuts were so completely screwed that I had to drive a socket onto one to get it off, over half of them had to be driven back out of the socket, and one only came out of the socket after being soaked in PB Blaster and completely smashed out. Don't know why Ram decided to save a few bucks per truck and use the absolute crappiest lug nuts I've ever seen on any vehicle I've ever had the tires off of but in the end they really just annoyed the crap out of me and cost me an extra $75.

For anybody that's interested, Mcgard only offers cone seat lug nuts in 14x1.5 that fit our trucks; I went with the standard cone seat as they were about $50 cheaper than the bulge cone seat. However, I'm not happy with the way the standard cone seats fit the stock wheels so I've now ordered a set of the bulge cone seats. I think they'll contact the wheels a lot better. That was a $75 mistake as I can't return the other set. So hopefully this can save someone else the cost of the mistake I already made.

 

[smiley]

The factory lugs do bulge as they are not solid. I think the main issue is just what you saw on here. The size is 22mm and people use the wrong size and it messes them up. I bought a used set after mine got messed up by a tire shop. Next set I am going solid so I don't have it happen again as I also have a handful that are bulged again.