Aluminium Wheel Nuts - Use Care - Lost a wheel at 60km/hr today - stripped bolts PICS

[TurboRA28]

*Joel hangs his head in shame and throws alloy wheel nuts in the bin. I must have been lucky having them last a few years and many many track days.
No need to push my luck though!

[oldcorollas]

Aluminum wheel nuts?
I wouldn't trust something as necessary to ones own safety with something like aluminum wheel nuts. Basic understanding of metallurgy would suggest that alloy is not going to stand up to the wear and tear, I would more so suggest this was an accident waiting to happen. Common sense would tell me not to use aluminum wheel nuts over any period of time for the simple fact that aluminum is such a soft metal...

like the old castrol ad..

Alloys aint Alloys... some Al alloys are harder and stronger than steeel alloys

[Billzilla]

like the old castrol ad..

Alloys aint Alloys... some Al alloys are harder and stronger than steeel alloys

Yep, which is why I have no problems using alloy wheel nuts.
If you use them properly and maintain them, they will give no trouble.

[merc-blue]

also the term billet is offten miss used to mean machined (not cast), instead of refering to forged alloy

[kingmick]

Yep, which is why I have no problems using alloy wheel nuts.
If you use them properly and maintain them, they will give no trouble.

Exactly,but there is the problem on a day to day car on the street that is looked after by people, 1, that don't understand that quality is very important compared to pretty anodized and alloy bragging rights and 2 that you don't just do them up with a rattle gun or tyre brace to what feels nice.

Used the right way with the right quality they would be fine but very few people would get both right
There is also the fact that most people wouldn't replace them like race cars do to minimise the chance of fatigue failure.

My opinion is that if you are not a very experienced person with DYI and you just use them like you would steel ones with no thought to how they are used,DONT use them.

Im sure this would be agreed by all??

[oldcorollas]

fwiw, the Rays ones here http://www.rayswheels.co.jp/2004/pro...rg_bottom.html say they are duralumin and weigh about 22-25grams each
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Duralumin

450MPa should be enough and is typical of normal steels

pure Al is around 50MPa and you can get over 700MPa aluminium alloys

if anyone has an SAE subscription, look at SAE J995, J417 and J1835 standards for steel nuts