Lug Nut Torque Indicators:
Reviews from Professional Truck Drivers

Are your truck's lug nuts on securely? Would having lug nut torque indicators help you know that at a glance?

On our student driver page, we revealed how we were instructed during truck driver training school to look on the tractor trailer during a pre-trip inspection at the rig's lug nuts to make sure that they were not "cracked, broken or missing." But we were not informed about checking to make sure that they were tight enough.

Tragedy on the Road

An accident caused by a tractor trailer in mid August 2011 (as of the time of this writing) is still under investigation and the article itself is a bit confusing. While one part indicated that the entire rear axle of the truck came off, it also said that the trailer's wheels came off. The wheels that separated from the truck ended up killing a woman.

To us, this underscores how critical it is during a pre-trip inspection check to make sure that there are no loose lug nuts and that the lug nut torque is sufficient.

Reasons for Loose Wheels

A June 4, 2007 article said this:

Ron Heusser, who has been in the accident-reconstruction field more than 20 years, said he's never seen so many accidents caused by truck tires.

"It's not common at all for wheels to come off," said Heusser, who owns Engineering Accident Analysis in Kent. "Typically, it's either a bearing failure that comes from lack of grease, oil or over-torquing or loose lug nuts."

A page on the website of a company that makes Lug-Lock^TM states:

Loose wheel nuts can occur for a variety of reasons, including undertorquing, overtorquing, differential thermal contraction, and improper mating surfaces. ...

Wheels are subjected to a variety of forces, including vertical forces from the vehicle and its cargo, road vibration and shock forces, cornering forces when the vehicle turns, and rotational forces from the turning of the wheel, especially during acceleration and braking. ...

An Invention to Help Spot Loose Lug Nuts

To assist with making sure that there are no loose lug nuts on a truck which can give rise to "wheel separation accidents," there is an invention that we call "lug nut torque indicators" that we have seen installed (mostly on the steer tires) of some trucks. The Wheel-Check.com website refers to these as "loose wheel nut indicators." Vicki took a picture of a set of these in April 2010, as shown here.

A page on their website shows how lug nut torque can loosen during transit, making an unsafe situation. And they also have a page on their site with links to articles about truck tire wheel separation accidents.

What We Personally Saw

The only time when we have ever seen a wheel come off a vehicle was late at night on I-85 in northern South Carolina. We were traveling near a four wheeler whose driver had to quickly exit the road amid sparks as the axle dragged the ground when the left rear wheel separated practically right in front of us.

The wheel with the tire still on it rolled right up alongside the concrete barrier that separated the road from the median. No one was hurt (other than being shaken up emotionally, we imagine).

But the situation could have been dire if a very heavy wheel (or pair of wheels) had come off a large truck!

Statistics on Truck Wheel Separation

Wheel-Check's home page has a video with a couple of interesting facts:

• "The NTSB has estimated that trucks lose about 1,000 wheels a year on America's roads, almost 3 a day." (1:50)
• "In Canada, the Wheel-Check triangles are on just about every truck. The difference? North of the border, the fine for a loose wheel is up to $50,000. Here in the U.S., it's about $150." (3:15)

Barriers to Using Lug Nut Torque Indicators

Obviously, if a driver has decorative wheel covers on his/her rig's lug nuts -- like the spikes shown at right -- then it is impossible to install the lug nut torque indicators on the lug nuts. (To us, these decorations look a bit aggressive. They remind us of the scythed wheels on one chariot in the race in the movie Ben-Hur. But we digress....)

If you are a professional truck driver and you have used lug nut torque indicators (or loose wheel nut indicators) in the course of your work within the last 6 months, we invite you to review it on this page through the form below, answering questions such as these:

• Which wheels on your rig did you use the indicators on?
• Have you ever found a loose lug nut or wheel nut as a result of using the product?
• How would you rate the quality of the product?
• Was the product worth the price you paid for it?
• How did the product save you time or money or both?
• Would you buy the product again and why?

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