OcangCLK

So last night after a gym session with my fiancee, I was home feeling amped about dinner and to my dismay I heard a loud screeching noise coming from my driver side rear wheel area. I stopped immediately and went outside to see what had happened. My eyes opened when I saw my wheel bearing laying directly on top of my rim. WTF All 5 lug bolts had snapped off!!! I was only a block away from my house and this **** had to happen. So called the a tow truck through my insurance but after looking at the car he said he couldn't help. He said that he didn't want to be liable it something happens to the car, which I understood, I'm not gonna let someone tow my baby unless they knew what they were doing. Then like an angel from the sky, I saw another tow truck passing by and flagged him, told him my situation and he willingly helped me out. He carted off the car with his truck and safely placed it in my garage. I offered him money then a pack of beer but he refused and just said what are neighbors for. Don't know exactly where he lives but I'll surely find him and send him a nice gift.

What I'm thankful for:
1) Glad we made it home safe and sound
2) Glad it didn't happen on the freeway, which we just got off from, and where things could've been much worse.
3) Hoping it's only a wheel bearing issue and a scrapped up rim
4) Helpful neighbors

Questions I have:
1) How the hell did the bolts snap off like that?? Is it because it's a longer aftermarket one.
2) How do I prevent it from doing it again?
3) Methods to get the leftover bolt out of the bearing

bheng

why kind of bolts did you buy?

you should look into what grade the bolts are. i believe grade 8 is OEM bmw and mercedes.
get grade 10 if you want the highest grade (i think thats the highest).

OcangCLK

Not sure what grade they are but I bought it from a reputable vendor here in the bay, not gonna mention the name but exactly in Mountain View. Where did you buy yours Brian?

Jamesbbh

This has nothing to do with the quality of the bolt itself. There is some kind of serious clearance/brake/rim/bolt length issue that caused this. Even if these were grade 1, they would not all shear off like that unless you slid into a curb or something sideways.

dynomite05

Ouch, that's not good.

Mka77

Whatever it was, it took a lot force/pressure to sheer all five bolts regardless of grade at this point. One maybe, five....

chrislis

what james said. the grade has nothing to do with it at this point. you've got some actual issues with your suspension/hubs/bearings. something is out of whack for all five to snap off. what causes this can be many things. bad bearings, over tightening the lugs (this is VERY common at tire shops believe it or not). There's deffinately a vibration issue within your wheel/hub going on whether you notice it or not, to have all five snap off at the same time, most likely it began with one or two vibrating, knocking your allignment/balance/calibration off and shaking the others to braking points. Uneven pressure on the bolts will make them wear and break.

There's tons of possibilities, but I would put some effort into thinking about who put your wheels on, how they did it, what they used to measure the tightness to them, etc. Torque wrenches should be used, if not it's a guess. There's no such thing as a perfect guess. Think about it.

Jamesbbh

I would take the wheel/car to whoever installed everything and put some major foot to A**.

If my wheel came flying off while I was driving down the road I might actually fight the guy that caused it. I'm normally a very mellow, easy going guy too.

chrislis

Most shops just use impact guns until they hear the click. Also, they could have cross threaded your bolts, take a gander at them and see if any of them are stripped in any way shape or form. Most people don't double check their cars when they come out of a shop just assuming all is fine.

OcangCLK

It could've been a series of stuff that happened over time but when it happened it was a straight drive. I found 4 bolts around the car, someone might've tried to steal my rims at the gym or something and took off one bolt, don't really know. No matter what I'm still fortunate that something worst didn't happen. Lesson learn: take care of the little stuff like checking bolts and maintenance of daily driving before MODS lol

Damn, this is the 1st issue I have with the car.. just got the car towed to the benz dealership in San Francisco. We'll see what they say .. my girl is taking care of everything since she works there, thank God.

bheng

i stand corrected. i figured if the bolts snapped off it could be of poor grade. but i didnt think it would be any of those above mentioned. ima check my bolts and retorque them today

Jamesbbh

Yea everytime I have to put on/take off wheels I hand tighten--lower jack--torque--drive--retorque--then retorque about once a month. Also, even if ONE lug was missing you would still be able to drive around without the others breaking off like that. Ive seen people with 5-6 lug vehicles drive around with two missing(not recommended) but it still worked. The way a hub/wheel is designed(if everything fits correctly) really doesn't end up putting all that much stress on one bolt at any given time. So it would help to have high strength rated bolts, but they aren't a necessity. I'm guessing you're going to have to replace that whole hub because they either got REALLY hot somehow and sheared off or were overtorqued to the point where the mechanic thought he was hearing the torque wrench click but it was acually the bolts braking inside the sleeve, just leaving enough threaded in to wiggle out eventually.

Jamesbbh

Those are just random guesses, it could be a few things. Good luck getting everything fixed though. I noticed you said your bolts were longer than factory? The ones I'm using on my wheels/spacers are actually shorter than the factory lugs.

kostas86

That sux, but luckily no major issues or even worse... a crash.

Klinh

Why is everyone is talking about his wheel bolts with this issue? It have nothing to do with it. It his bearing hex nut that work itself loose. Those nut requires around 150 ft.-lbs of torque when install. To check, you have to pop the egg shelf looking end cover to expose the hex nut. Most car design have the safety pin at the end of the nut to jam the nut just in case the nut work itself loose.

Jamesbbh

I thought he said all of the bolts snapped off somewhere so I quit reading after that lol. So you're trying to say that a cotter pin was missing or fell out and caused the whole bearing nut to work out?

Ocang- was your rim still bolted to the piece that fell off the car or were the lug bolts just laying around everywhere?

OcangCLK

Thanks again everyone for the replies..

No it wasn't anymore, the susp. system was layin on top of the inner wheel lip, the lug bolts were laying around everywhere, all 5 snapped off but leaving some threads in the wheel bearing. Hope that makes sense.

Klinh

I said most car design would have a safety pin after the bearing nut to prevent the bearing nut from completely work itself loose. The pin is a secondary safety design. I don't know if Mercedes have these safety design in place. In my opinion, his bearing nut came loose that caused this problem. Usually when the wheel bolts break off, the wheel felt off but the wheel bearing, spindle, rotors...etc still intact. In his case, he said that his wheel bearing were on top of his wheel.

Jamesbbh

This ^^^^^

I'm still sticking with either:

A: the mechanic thought the torque wrench/impact wrench was clicking but he was actually breaking the bolts but they were wedged in there enough to last a while, hence he couldn't find one of them that failed at a different time (which was also probably the one with a few threads holding the rest of them in).
B: They were rbbing on something on the back side of the bolt and got hot enough to shear them all when they reached a temperature failing point (not likely, but still maybe)

Oh and Klihn, I wasn't calling you out or anything I was just trying to clarify. Cheers buddy!

apb

Get new botls from rad usa direct . com (in one word) and don't trust an Ebay seller.

Mka77

Agreed. Phil there will take care of you.

Klinh

1st post, you said "when I saw my wheel bearing laying directly on top of my rim". Now, your 2nd describes, that does not sound like anything to do with the bearing. It sound like the wheel bolts just broken off and your wheels felt off.

Clkboi

Holy **** man i am glad you are ok.
Best of luck to you

lowpost

you should have taken some pics - then you could get some better opinions.