When is tight too bleeping tight.

I just finished re working the front brakes on my 04 Jeep Liberty. It took over 3 hours. For the second time I have had to drill out a lug stud on this wheel. The first time was shortly after I bought it and  front hose broke and needed to be replaced. the PO had trashed the sheet metal cover over the lug nuts and a couple rusted in place and when I tried to remove them the nuts rounded off, hence the drilling them out. Fast forward to sometime last year, I send the wife over to a discount tire place, to get an inexpensive set of tires, as the Jeep just a backup vehicle now and we have decide to drive it until it falls apart. Anyway today I go to remove the same front wheel and the 150 ftlb impact I have won't budge the lug nuts. I try to use my 15" half drive ratchet with pipe and fear for the ratchet. So I decide to run to Harbor Freight for a 3/4" female to 1/2" male adaptor( the first one I have ever found) so I can use the 3/4" breaker bar with the 1/2" drive impact sockets. I get back and remove 4 of the lug nuts with the 3/4" breaker bar and a 3ft pipe.  (300-400ftlbs by my estimate)  And the last one the lug nut shears in half just above the taper on the lug nut. Bring out an 1/8" drill to drill a pilot hole and then a 7/16" drill to drill out the rest. Now after getting the wheel off I still had to use a punch to remove the taper of the lug nut from the wheel.   If I would have taken this to a shop they would have charged me $150 - $200 to fix this. Also the other side needed the breaker bar and pipe to remove the lug nuts. 

I have never repeat never had to resort to using a pipe and breaker bar to remove a lug nut I had tightened. Also I have never had a wheel come loose. I use a proper cross tightening pattern and go around 2-3 times to make sure everything is tight and even.

My biggest fear is being on a busy expressway with a flat and needing to call a tow because some tire tech needed to shave 1 minute off a tire change. ($.30 worth) not to mention the damage to an aluminum wheel from over tightening. I really would like to send these people a bill for my time and material in fixing this. thoughts?

My friend has a 2015 328 x-drive that took about a minute per wheel using a Milwaukee 2767 impact (1400 ft-lbs of loosening torque) in short bursts to loosen the lug bolts. It had just had a new set of tires installed at the dealer. Torque spec is something under 100 ft-lbs of torque, can’t imagine how much they abused the impact to get them that tight! If I hadn’t see it in person, I would never have believed it...

There are too many factors and way too much time has passed for me to condemn the tire shop for what has happened here.  The environment lug studs and nuts live in is harsh and variable.   Realistically...old lug nuts and studs are a gamble.  A lot of people get mad, but this happens a lot.  

You've already had rust problems on studs on this wheel.  If you didn't have all new studs and nuts, you knew this was going to happen.  Ok...maybe you didn't know until now, but you know...right?

I also have this major pet-peave (shops overtightening lug nuts).  So if I don't trust the shop, I make sure I loosen and re-torque the nuts right after the work gets done.  

That's my 2 cents.

I put anti seize on all my studs to help prevent this. I know there is a big debate about this but I have been doing it for 35 year with out issue. Living up here in the rust belt it is almost a necessity. I have a  old 3/8 drive impact that I use to snug things up and then finish with a torque wrench. The 3/8 impact I have will only get lugs up to about 85 foot lbs. it is real nice if I have to get tires on fast with out worrying about over torquing things. 

I posted some time ago how the front lug nuts froze up but the rears didn't.  Not a case of over tightening since I installed them myself.    I never had this happen before.   The wheels and nuts had been used on my SE a few times. So it must be something with the FiST.

The kid working at the tire shop for $10/hr is the same kid who berkeleyed up your order at mcdonalds for $8/hr last week. He didn’t get any smarter in the last seven days or with the raise.

Sounds like they used too many ugga-duggas.

American chrome covered wheel nuts are 18mm after you lose the chrome cap.

Just sayin'

I have an old jack handle I use for a snipe. I've had upwards of 45 degrees of bend in the handle of my Snap on breaker bar getting wheels off sometimes.

Snipe. Is that the official name for a cheater pipe?

It is around here...

I thought you hunted snipe as a kid on camping trips?

I install my own wheels and torque them accordingly. BUT, after 6 months the lug bolts on my MINI will always have one that won't come out with less than a 4 foot cheater bar on it, and I use anti-seize on the bolts. They just seem to corrode in place.

I always use a little bit of grease on the threads to keep things rust free. Yesterday I was quite frustrated over this as there was a lot of time wasted that was planned out to do other things. Things that are still undone. My biggest problem I have taught my children and now grandchildren to be able to change their own tires and I cringe at the thought of them encountering over tight lug nuts on a rainy night with a dead cellphone.