Stripped lug nut...can't remove wheel...help!

So I went to do a tire rotation the other day and had three tires off and the fourth tire, the last lug nut would not budge. To make a long story short the outside of the lug nut stripped and the cap came off.

If I drill the bolt to remove the nut do I have to replace just the bolt or will I need to replace the axle shaft?

If you're still using those crummy 2 piece lugnuts, IIRC the inner part will come off with a slightly smaller socket, and you may want to try both SAE and metric.

Thanks but I don't believe I can get another socket on it.

yep... it can be a bear though. I had a bunch of those on mine. One of them not only stripped out, it left the stupid sheetmetal cap jammed into the lug wrench! Took me 30 minutes of cursing and wrangling with it with my leatherman to remove that darn thing.

You won't have to replace the axle shaft if you are careful, just make sure you don't drill any further than the lug nut goes on and you'll be able to press out what's left of the lug and press in a new one with a stack of washers and a spare lug nut. Shouldn't cost you more than a couple bucks for a new lug at NAPA.

Thanks Kastein, I'll give it a go. Once the bolt is drilled what is involved in replacing the bolt?

Which wheel, front or rear?

Front - remove wheel, remove brake caliper, remove rotor, press or pound out stub (prefer press, pounding can damage the wheel bearings), snake the new stud in, might have to rotate the wheel flange a bit to get it to a spot where it'll go in. Get your stack of 1/2" washers out, put em on till the non threaded portion of the stud is covered, crank the lug on a few turns, remove, take off a washer or two, rinse lather repeat. Reinstall everything you removed to get at it.

Rear - remove wheel, remove brake drum (chock wheels and release parking brake), press/pound out stub, same stud installation process, reinstall everything you removed.

It's really not that difficult, took maybe 5 minutes to swap one while we were installing a new axle in a friend's jeep a month or two ago. Of course we hadn't installed the brake rotors or calipers or anything else yet so that's only the time to install the stud, not removing/reinstalling stuff to get at it. He was on a tight budget so we just stole a stud off the old axle before scrapping it.

Great! Thanks for the help! I have my old 8.25 I'll pound one out of that!

Sears has a external easyout solution that should work for you.

old_man said:

Sears has a external easyout solution that should work for you.

Click to expand...

and they are worth their weight in gold.

I managed to strip one of the 4 nuts holding my trans mount to the crossmember last night while swapping my drivetrain. 30 seconds with a BFH and one of the smaller bolt/nut extractors and it was out. If it hadn't been for that, I would have had to leave my rig parked out in the open (in my semi bad neighborhood, that means it'd be missing things by morning) and would have probably had to chop up the trans mount or the crossmember to get it apart.

Unless you have real deep alloy wheels with clearance issues on the lug nuts, these will work great.

EDIT: hope you mean you're pulling a lug off your old 8.25 and putting it on your new rear axle, because rear/front lug studs are different iirc. I know they are different between a 35 and a 30.

Try an beat a 18mm shocket on to it..Use a cheap one.. ...Just go slow..I found after you lose the metal cap a 18 fits perfect...I have most of my little caps off now..
HTH

auto part stores sell this bolt grippers type of sockets I had to buy it when i golt one of my lug nuts stuck on I couldnt get a smaller socket but one of those babys did wonders its a funny shaped hole so it digs into whatever your tryna take out there great. My Job harbor freight sells them for cheap but there the ones that go on a drill. the auto parts store has the ones that go on a ratcheting wrench.

Don't screw it up any worse so you have to replace the stud. Drive it down to the local tire changing place and ask them to get it off. They deal with this all the time with those stupid locking lug nuts. They have a nice hammer-on socket that takes those suckers off lickety-split. Probably only charge you $10 plus even sell you a new lug nut for $2.. You could probably get them to rotate the tires for another $20. :}

a decent set of lugnuts go a long way, those 2 peice's with the chrome cap are for the birds! get rid of em before they burn you!