MY WHEEL FELL OFF!

So I took The Impala out yesterday, considering it had been the first nice day in about a week, drove to work, no issues. I leave work and do my usual passing of slower drivers and notice a hint of vibration. I realize I'm in OD and by that time was going slower so I shift down to D and continue on my route. I only use OD at highway speeds. Now, I'm only doing about 50 and don't really notice pryor vibration. I get to the highway and as usual get into it and hammer up the on-ramp, there is the vibration again, very hint, but there. I play with accelerator a bit and it will go away with more acceleration. Now this season will be the last for definitely the rear tires and probably the fronts as well. I did change out the end links in the front and know I need an alignment, so with the vibration very minimal I continue. Short ride up HWY, get to house, pickup wifey and are off to SKIP'S Hamburgers. Still nothing alarming, almost feels like tranny dragging. Now my thoughts go to common tranny failure and figure if it's going to happen it's going to happen, at some point. We eat and decide to cruise the beach. Make our way through Salisbury up 1A and without warning it as if I ran over a 55 gallon drum and am dragging it, ass-end falls to ground and I pull to the sideand in the mirror I see rear driver wheel fall completely off! I get out and the rotor is sitting on the pavement. With my arms up in udder shock I see that one of the studs broke off, one bent, but none of the remaining are stripped. I move over to the wheel with lug cover still on and all the lugs still sitting in there. I go through the process of jacking it up and putting the rim and tire back on, it was gnawed to shit on the inside. I'm able to crank the four remaining lugs onto the studs and I slowly traveled back home.

The only damage was a scorn inner rim and the rear molding was pulled out by tire coming out of the well. Does this molding simply glue back on? Or is it tack welded at all. To me It looked simply glued but with it not all the way off I didn't want to damaged it more by yanking on it. Also, are those removable lugs or are they part of the hub? Not quite sure why any of this happened. I did rotate tires about a month ago and I know I tightended the lugs, plus I probably put 300mi on since then with no signs. Of course my mind goes to sabotage but I don't have any enemies and I have't slept with anyones wife since I was in my early twenties. With one stud broke and still on the nut and others not stripped I just don't get it.

Thanks for letting me ramble, I needed to get this of my chest.

Same thing happened to me in the 9C1, but I didn't make it as far as you. Root cause, lack of torquing lug nuts

That sucks man. But the good news is no one was hurt.

As for the trim. It clips on the body, and there is one screw at the bottom of each end at the very bottom.

IMPALADAKID wrote:

That sucks man. But the good news is no one was hurt.

No doubt, at least I wasn't bootin' down the highway.

IMPALADAKID wrote:

As for the trim. It clips on the body, and there is one screw at the bottom of each end at the very bottom.

Sweet thanks just finished breakfast gonna go mess with it.

That's one reason for double checking your lugs after about 100 miles after any wheel service. Last time I swapped a tire I rechecked the lugs after about 150 miles and a couple of them were about 3/4 turn from being tight. It's amazing how they can back off just from vibration and heating cycles.

Damn Matt! That sucks!!!!

I bet you buy a torque wrench now tho.

And like Billy said, it just has tabs bent over to hold it to the body in the arch of the wheelwell and a screw at each end. Hop you got it back together today.

I did get the molding back on, not to much trouble. I had to be carefull not to damage it any further, doesn't look terrible. I'm geussing that I need a hub puller to get to the lugs. I'm going to hit Advanced in the morning, hopefully they rent one.

you dont need a hub puller, you have to take the rear end cover off take out the cross shaft and spider gears then you can get the c-clips off to get the axles out

mean ss wrote:

you dont need a hub puller, you have to take the rear end cover off take out the cross shaft and spider gears then you can get the c-clips off to get the axles out

Yikes, that sounds scary! Do you think a first timer would be wise to tackle?

go for it, just dont break the small cross shaft retaining bolt
how many studs are bad ?

mean ss wrote:

go for it, just dont break the small cross shaft retaining bolt
how many studs are bad ?

Just one is broke, but was going to swap out all five just in case. Looking through Haynes manual and of coarse they make it look much easier than it really is. I'll probably take a stab at it on Wednesday.

if it was one or two ,I have seen people just hammer out the bad ones then with a bunch of washers and a
nut pull the new studs in with an air gun to seat them

I've broken studs before by over torquing them. I put in new ones using that washer method. Taking out the axles isn't a big deal and a perfect time to change your differential fluid and cover gasket.

i usually torque my lug nuts to 100lbft. and i try to retorque them at least once every month because that is necessary when dealing with aluminum wheels

Those studs probably died of old age &/ or abuse
I used to yell at the tire guy for over-torquing my wifes wheels
I can tell you having a rear wheel fall off a 70's corvette is UGLY, it just goes right thru the fiberglass

well after reading this post. i went out today and checked mine. had three loose on two different wheels. i torqued them down to 105 lbs. now i feel better.

I'm checking mine now too...

The only car I ever saw this happen on was a late 70s Lincoln Mark V. It wasn't pretty, damn near tore the whole passenger side of the car off!

So I got to pulling the transaxle today, wasn't to bad. I did have to go and buy an 8mm six-point socket for the retainer bolt in the diff. The 12-point I had started to strip it. I replaced all five studs....for now crisis averted.

I knew you could do it

mean ss wrote:

I knew you could do it

Support much appriciated!

How'd the other side look? while you were in there
At least do a visual so your safe

sdstick wrote:

How'd the other side look?

The other side?....I made sure the rest of the wheels were torqued to a 100lbs.

onehunglo wrote:

So I got to pulling the transaxle today, wasn't to bad. I did have to go and buy an 8mm six-point socket for the retainer bolt in the diff. The 12-point I had started to strip it. I replaced all five studs....for now crisis averted.

Sucks that it happened, but glad to hear you fixed it.

Good job, Matty!

See ya tomorrow! and you better be RACING!

I plan on meeting up with you guys at BK's but have to be at work at 8:00

onehunglo wrote:

I plan on meeting up with you guys at BK's but have to be at work at 8:00

I dunno man... You don't look so good. And that cough is terrible. You may want to think twice about going in...