Oiled Or Greased Studs?

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In the Prius owner manual they tell you not to oil or grease the wheel studs because the nuts may loosen.
I've been lubing mine for decades and never seemed to notice any problems with wheels loosening.

Do you lube your studs or not?
 
Lug nuts are to be installed dry. The friction between the ball ,seat and threads are what keeps them on. Lubricate one of those and you lose 1/2 of the things that keep them on.
 
With steel wheels it is important that the area where the lug nut bears on the wheel is dry bare metal. Putting oil or grease on the threads is OK but don't overdo it.
 
I never oil mine. Never even knew people did this until recently.
 
Yes, I grease mine. My owner's manual (Buick) says not to use oil or grease on the lug nuts or studs.

It also has a maintenance schedule that goes only to 150K miles. Left that on every vehicle I've ever owned.

I've been using Sil Glyde on my lug studs for 30+ years, along with a torque wrench and I reduce torque by 10% due to lube. Never had any issue. Those engineers who wrote the manual with advice and consent from attorneys aren't going to be there on a dark and stormy night to change a tire for me. FWIW, my owner's manual has NO scheduled maintenance for brake fluid nor power steering fluid changes, but I do these because it lets me sleep better at night; and common sense tells me that hydraulic systems work better with clean fluid.
My owner's manual also tells me to check my Windshield Washer fluid level at each fuel fill. Who does that?

Peace, Love & Jellybeans
 
I use T9 Boeshield. One drop on the threads near the end of the bolt or stud so that it "carries" when you screw things together. I let it dry before reassembly. Never use anything on taper or ball socket.

Scott
 
Originally Posted by Ihatetochangeoil
Yes, I grease mine. My owner's manual (Buick) says not to use oil or grease on the lug nuts or studs.

It also has a maintenance schedule that goes only to 150K miles. Left that on every vehicle I've ever owned.

I've been using Sil Glyde on my lug studs for 30+ years, along with a torque wrench and I reduce torque by 10% due to lube. Never had any issue. Those engineers who wrote the manual with advice and consent from attorneys aren't going to be there on a dark and stormy night to change a tire for me. FWIW, my owner's manual has NO scheduled maintenance for brake fluid nor power steering fluid changes, but I do these because it lets me sleep better at night; and common sense tells me that hydraulic systems work better with clean fluid.
My owner's manual also tells me to check my Windshield Washer fluid level at each fuel fill. Who does that?

Peace, Love & Jellybeans

If you don't over torque your wheels you won't need those puppetized engineers to loosen those lug nuts on a dark and stormy night. You might have to go more than 10% under if you're using a lubricant on the wheel studs. I personally wouldn't lubricate the studs.
 
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I broke off 5 studs on my Subaru Impreza over a two year period. Lug-nuts were torqued to spec with a torque wrench. Never ever had an issue with any previous cars.

Every single one broke when removing the wheel. The lug-nut would loosen slightly, then bind up on the stud and seize. When forced, the stud would snap.

I was told the cause was thread galling ( sometimes called cold welding ), made worse by Subaru's choice of a finer thread pitch for the studs, and low quality OE stainless lug nuts. I had never heard of that before, but was advised to put a VERY light dab of anti-seize on the threads only. Over 7 years and dozens of wheel swaps, I haven't had a problem since ...
 
I often had a hard time loosening my cars' lugnuts come rotation time (every 13,000 miles) until I started to use a little engine oil or grease on the threads. I use 20% less torque than the dry spec. I kept a close eye on them every month, to see if any would loosen, but none ever did. Now I check them every 6 months. Again, not one ever loosened. And I have 5 vehicles, 4 have alloy wheels, 1 has steel.
 
Tiny bit of anti seize on the threads. And a torque wrench set to 84. I've had my run-ins will galled threads and snapped studs over the years. I've never had a wheel come off or a snapped thread since then. And this includes a car with many many track laps on R-Compound rubber. Don't over do it, be mindful of not torquing the snot out of the nuts, and only use a smidge and you'll be fine.

This topic is generally as contentious as anti-seize on spark plugs.
 
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Originally Posted by super20dan
been oiling mine for 50 years. never a problem


Same here ever since I twisted off so many prior to lubing the studs with something/anything. I used any grease in the past and never an issue. Now I just use anti seize. No-blem! :+)
 
I grease the lug bolts and the contact area between wheel and hub.Wheels stay on until I take them off with tools in the trunk. I haven't touched the alloys on the Fridge yet. In days of yore, I developed a process using a length of 4X4, some dunnage, and a sledgehammer The lugs on a BMW with hub-centric wheels are just needed until wheel bonds to hub
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Be very careful with lube on the lug nut contact face. We ran controlled studies with different lubricating scenarios on wheel studs. In one case we found slathering lube on the threads and contact face resulted in a cracked stud when torquing to spec.
 
Anti-seize and torque wrench to 85# on every car I've owned since '95 or so, and always re-check torque after 50-100mi.

Only time I've ever found slight looseness on check was with a set of never-before-mounted alu rims.

N.B., I live in the rust belt and salted/brined roads are a fact of life.
 
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