tire shops and over torquing lug nuts

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lairdwd

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Well my wife's honda needs a tire rotation, and I'm thinking of bringing it to my local tire shop that I can get a freebie done since I bought my tires there. It's town fair tire, and their website says it's SOP to torque to spec, but in real life, do the kids just zip it on with the air gun?

I'm a little nervous though that they will over torque. Any words of wisdom? What equipment do I need for DIY tire rotation? Is there some middle ground, like I let them do it, then I loosen and retorque the lugs myself?
 
Once had a uneven/overtorqued lug(s) with an impact wrench, cost me a rotor.

They should at the very least use a torque stick with the impact wrench, then you can retorque/check with a torque wrench of your own.

Luckily since finding Discount Tire, they put the torque wrench to every lug, every time.
 
I have Discount tire rotate and balance my tires, and they do use torque wrenches to tighten the lug nuts. As soon as I get home I loosen all my lug nuts and retorque them with my own torque wrench, which gets used 10,000% less then the ones at Discount tire and is more likely to be in proper calibration then theirs.
 
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Originally Posted By: lairdwd
I'm a little nervous though that they will over torque. Any words of wisdom? What equipment do I need for DIY tire rotation? Is there some middle ground, like I let them do it, then I loosen and retorque the lugs myself?


The tire shop I use actually lets me watch them torque the wheels with a torque wrench after they show me the setting (76ft-lbs). They also told me I'm the only customer that asks.
Normally they use torque stix. mostly set at 100 ft-lbs.
And then, yes, 100 miles later I retorque them at home using my TQ wrench.
 
Originally Posted By: lairdwd
Well my wife's honda needs a tire rotation, and I'm thinking of bringing it to my local tire shop that I can get a freebie done since I bought my tires there. It's town fair tire, and their website says it's SOP to torque to spec, but in real life, do the kids just zip it on with the air gun?

I'm a little nervous though that they will over torque. Any words of wisdom? What equipment do I need for DIY tire rotation? Is there some middle ground, like I let them do it, then I loosen and retorque the lugs myself?


Let them do their tire rotation on it. Torque sticks are not accurate, I don't use them. I just know my impact gun. I never warped a rotor or had a wheel fall off in 15 years (either on my own cars or customers). You will be fine, they do it everyday.
 
'Luckily since finding Discount Tire, they put the torque wrench to every lug, every time."

Same here.
 
I highly doubt that town fair torques tires on correctly.

I used town fair for years and many cars until last fall when they royally screwed up an order I placed and gave me the wrong tires. The error was due to improper training of a new employee.

Your guaranteed to know that the work you do is correct, you don't know if the person at the store did it correctly or not. I had two bad experiences with town fair that left me with a bad taste and I don't trust them or like them anymore but I won't jack your thread and just give you my advice to rotate them yourself.
 
Originally Posted By: cos
I have Discount tire rotate and balance my tires, and they do use torque wrenches to tighten the lug nuts. As soon as I get home I loosen all my lug nuts and retorque them with my own torque wrench, which gets used 10,000% less then the ones at Discount tire and is more likely to be in proper calibration then theirs.

I take my torque wrench with me to the tire shop and i loosen them and torque them in the parking lot before i drive. I do this for 2 reasons, it there is a lug i cannot remove i am still there, second if the torque is really uneven and you drive and use the brakes, the heat sets the warp in the rotors. Since i have been doing this, i have not had a warped rotor in 15 years.
 
Originally Posted By: lairdwd
Well my wife's honda needs a tire rotation, and I'm thinking of bringing it to my local tire shop that I can get a freebie done since I bought my tires there. It's town fair tire, and their website says it's SOP to torque to spec, but in real life, do the kids just zip it on with the air gun?

I'm a little nervous though that they will over torque. Any words of wisdom? What equipment do I need for DIY tire rotation? Is there some middle ground, like I let them do it, then I loosen and retorque the lugs myself?

Sometimes it depends on who's on the job. At one place where I go for alignments and such, I've seen some people use impact guns and others do it correctly with torque sticks.

IMO, when you go in, stress that you want it torqued properly, and see if you can observe just to keep them honest.
 
I"ve had them torqued them so bad that they broke my wheel covers...I do it myself now. Though I might give DT a try...
 
When I had mine done at Walmart, they torqued them. Drove some figure eights in the parking lot and re torqued them.
 
Originally Posted By: expat
'Luckily since finding Discount Tire, they put the torque wrench to every lug, every time."

Same here.

Discount Tire/America Tire uses torque wrench and so is Walmart.
 
Originally Posted By: lairdwd
Well my wife's honda needs a tire rotation, and I'm thinking of bringing it to my local tire shop that I can get a freebie done since I bought my tires there. It's town fair tire, and their website says it's SOP to torque to spec, but in real life, do the kids just zip it on with the air gun?

I'm a little nervous though that they will over torque. Any words of wisdom? What equipment do I need for DIY tire rotation? Is there some middle ground, like I let them do it, then I loosen and retorque the lugs myself?


Hi Lairdwd. The Town Fair Tire store in South Nashua, NH installed the snow tires on my car. The tires were installed on Ford Crown Vic 16" police steel wheels and they used a torque wrench. When they pulled the car in, my buddy and I watched the work being done just outside the garage door (which wasn't a restricted area) as it was a decent day outside.
 
+1 for Discount Tire, then. I've got a lot of choices to buy tires for the Durango here over the next couple of weeks. I have coupons for NTB and Sears and Firestone. But Discount Tire has the Michelin LTX's I want. I just hope we can come up with the whole $627 to get out the door with them. That's not even including their awesome certificates. But that would put us OVER $700.

I know, I know, I get the $70 gift card back from Michelin. And if DT will let me buy the certificates after it shows up, I'll do exactly that with that MasterCard gift card when it shows up.
 
Originally Posted By: lairdwd
Well my wife's honda needs a tire rotation, and I'm thinking of bringing it to my local tire shop that I can get a freebie done since I bought my tires there. It's town fair tire, and their website says it's SOP to torque to spec, but in real life, do the kids just zip it on with the air gun?

I'm a little nervous though that they will over torque. Any words of wisdom? What equipment do I need for DIY tire rotation? Is there some middle ground, like I let them do it, then I loosen and retorque the lugs myself?


Buy yourself a "click-style" torque wrench, 1/2". Also a breaker bar. And a set of deep socket 1/2" for the lugs.

www.harborfreight.com has the lug sockets that are coated.

After the tire shop, loosen & retorque them. Then after about 50 miles of driving, check the torque again.
 
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