300 ft/lbs of torque not needed.

[CallawayTurbo]

I'd like to thank the Porsche shop in North New Jersey that felt it was necessary
to put my wheel nuts on with something like 300 ft/lbs of torque.
I've always wanted to curl my 911 and now I have a good spot to attach a bar
that I can pull up on with all my might without fear of it coming loose.
I've never found it necessary to take my wheel nuts off and had been
contemplating welding them on but this is much better.

Clearly your shop does superior work!
Most shops do have the expertise to set the impact wrench to the end of the range and let it fly.

I'm sure if you can handle this detail so well that the other engine work you perform will be just as good!

[GWN7]

Ouch!

[Targa Me]

I feel your pain Brother.

This is what happened to me....

My daughter had new tires put on her Jetta and later on that day she had asked me to check her brakes. When I tried to remove the lug nuts I couldn't loosen them one bit. So I thought to myself, "no problem, I'll crank up the compressor and use the impact." I set it to max so I could just zip them off, but no. At max torque they wouldn't move. I'm talking 320 ft./lbs. of torque !

I grabbed my Snap-On torque wrench and drove to the tire shop. I spoke to the manager about their procedures in using proper torque values when tightening lug nuts. He assured me that the lugs were properly torqued and stated that might air gun must be at fault. So I handed him my torque wrench, preset to 80 ft/lbs (proper torque value for the Jetta) and asked him to remove a lug nut. To his surprise, he couldn't. So I reset the torque wrench to its max value, 360 ft/lbs and he still couldn't remove the lugs.

He finally got his air gun to remove them and used the torque wrench to tighten them.

The dumb-a$$.

[look 171]

Sorry to hear about it but what did you want us to say ?

[Geary]

Ranks right up there with the guy who tightens your trans oil-add plug to 100 lbs ..

[sketchers356]

I hate these fuchers

[vash]

the lugs are that tight? yikes..

my work truck..all the TPMS light lit up..i checked the pressure after bouncing to a stop. i had 90psi in each tire!! hahaha..that stick on the tire pressure gauge came poking out at light speed. taking out air, it sounded like i knifed a tire. the mech took the pressure suggestion on the sidewall..

[Arizona_928]

Hopefully you won't return. A shop stripped out the oil pan drain on my old 951. That was fun to replace....

Hopefully you don't break any studs either!

[Noah930]

I feel for ya.

I recently went to rotate the tires on Mrs. Noah's DD. The last one to touch the wheels was the dealer. I normally use the little lug nut iron that comes with the spare tire to take off the lug nuts (saves stress on the torque wrench, I figure). For the life of me I could not get two of the lug nuts off. There I was, 165 lbs of me, standing on the end of the tire iron, bouncing up and down, and I couldn't break two lug nuts free. I finally took the handle from my floor jack, slid it over the tire iron, and used that as a 4-foot long breaker bar. Sheesh.

[SilberUrS6]

I never let chain-store monkeys handle the wheels on any car. I take the wheels and tires off, take them where they need to go, and then fetch them back when they are done with whatever.

PITA? Damn skippy. But it sure beat replacing hubs because of broken studs or worse, snapped lug bolts. Or the time they forgot to tighten my wife's passenger rear lug bolts on her M-B, and the wheel and tire went for a little excursion on their own. That one had a bit of a pucker factor, boys.

The broken lug bolts were my warning. The loose wheel was the final straw.

[908/930]

After having a service at a BMW dealership, I tried to remove the wheels and found that they tightened the wheel nuts up to over 220 ft lbs, (I removing with torque wrench) the service manager insisted that they torque them with a calibrated torque wrench, sure they did. They supplied me with new wheel bolts after I suggested the old ones could be damaged.

Better to do your own work.

[CallawayTurbo]

Well, I found my old cheater bar. Two and a half feet of stiff steel that fits nicely over the toolkit lug wrench. Putting all my weight on it and some muscle I managed to break them free.

I guess I expected better from a shop that works pretty much exclusively on 911s.

On the plus side, this does make me wonder about the bad'ish leakdown numbers I got from them.

This is the 2nd Porsche shop that has "made me wonder".

[Gogar]

Whiners!

[Dantilla]

Originally Posted by SilberUrS6

I never let chain-store monkeys handle the wheels on any car. I take the wheels and tires off, take them where they need to go, and then fetch them back when they are done with whatever.

.

+1.

The local tire store has never seen the Porsche. Leave it on jackstands at home, haul the wheels & tires back and forth with the pick-up.

Tire store likes it because it frees up a service bay.

[afterburn 549]

Originally Posted by Dantilla

+1.

The local tire store has never seen the Porsche. Leave it on jackstands at home, haul the wheels & tires back and forth with the pick-up.

Tire store likes it because it frees up a service bay.

Plus 1

[KFC911]

Originally Posted by Dantilla

+1.

The local tire store has never seen the Porsche. Leave it on jackstands at home, haul the wheels & tires back and forth with the pick-up.

Tire store likes it because it frees up a service bay.

That's what I do too....my Fuchs are mint (painted Diamond Blue Metallic like my car), so they also know that I care a LOT....make a difference imo. I actually do get my car aligned at a tire store (recommended to me by a P-car guru)...if they can align an old VW, there's nothing special about 911s either. But again....I'm right there under the rack with the guy as he's doing it to the specs I desire....YMMV.

[onewhippedpuppy]

There is one Firestone store nearby that I trust my wheels/tires/alignments to. They torque every wheel by policy, I've even watched them use the torque wrench on other customer's cars. They also ask for extra time (and take it) with low profile tires and more expensive vehicles, which I am happy to provide. I think it helps that they are a complete auto shop with real mechanics, as opposed to a Jiffy Lube type place that only does simple work like tires and oil.

I had my first surrender moment this year with an oil filter on my new (to me) boat. Top mount oil filter, should have been a 30 second change. Except that Hercules was apparently the last mechanic. After finally resorting to a oil filter wrench with 3' cheater and actually twisting the filter in half, I ended up cutting off the can and cutting the base in half to remove the filter. Ultimately it cost me a new filter base from scarring the old one.

[Porsche-O-Phile]

I'm with silber and dantilla. This is a big part of why I do everything myself that I possibly can and if I don't know how, I learn. I've saved a metric schitetonne of money and god-knows-how-many headaches. The only thing I won't do is bodywork (although I do replace fenders, hoods, doors, panels). Too many idiots with power tools out there in the automotive world.

[vonsmog]

Well not on a Porsche, but I have had to remove the lug nuts on one Unimog by heating the lugnut cherry red with a torch and then breaker bar with a 6' pipe on it! My impact has 1400 lbs of torque for removing stubborn things and it would not budge them!! Needless to say the lugnuts were shot once removed.

[RedBaron]

I'm sure they are not that tight, do you even lift?