Cutting torch to lug nut

I had the same thing happen to me back before I knew much about fabricating and such. Wound up holesawing the rim - way dumb idea.

I wouldn't give up on the welder yet. The heat will loosen the suck lug. If you can't fit your MIG gun in the wheel hole, go buy some welding rod at Lowes or Home Depot and use 2 batteries and some jumper cable. You should certainly be able to feed some 3/32 welding rod in there.

 

My 2 cents: I've drilled out a lot of broken bolts working on jeeps over the years. If you have a bench grinder and are good, you can resharpen your own bits. I learned how a long time ago, but for me anyway it is a perishable skill. Takes practice. For me, it was worth it to buy one of those high speed drill bit sharpeners from Sears. I sharpened every drill bit I own in about 30 minutes. Being able to stop when the bits dulls some and resharpen it will SAVE your sanity many times over! As already mentioned, use oil to lube/cool it, and go slow.

Something no one has mentioned is a dremel. You may not have room to get in there with a small cutoff wheel, but maybe? Takes time and you may go thru several wheels but it will cut that lug nut. If not you can at least use it to dress up the end of the stud to provide a goos surface to hit it with a center punch to ensure you start centered.

OR--if you have drum brakes maybe you could remove the whole wheel/hub/drum assembly by removing the spindle nuts, then you could get a torch on the BACKSIDE of the stud. Not sure that would help any or do any good...although it would allow you to lay the wheel down flat while you are drilling it out from the front?!

 

Actually yes! My parents bought me a set for x-mas last year, and the first thing I said (too myself!) was "here's another one of those gimmicks, like the easy outs, that seldom work!".

Well, wouldn't you know it, they have worked on three separate occassions. I am happy with them so far.

Daniel

 

would pull the drum and grind off the head of the stud.

 

What Karl said is along the lines of what I was thinking. I'd be leery of driving the stud out that way though. Not sure if the splines on the stud go all the way down, meaning you might ruin the hub driving it out that way. It certainly couldn't hurt to be able to drill it from front and rear though.

 

A buddy of mine burned the nuts off an XJ with the stock alloys. Left a little black around the hole, but no real damage. Oh, excuse my vulgar language

 

If it were me I'd be grinding,cutting, or drilling on the NUT, not the stud. Split that thing open even a little and it will unthread.

I've done it sucessfully with a cutting torch, but that was a steel wheel.

Good Luck.
Pete

 

OK, I finally got time to get to it. Drilling and grinding just made a mess. This is on my XJ with alloy wheels. Cutting torch did it really easily. I just need to pull the hub now and press out the old stud and press in a new one. Didn't seem to hurt the wheel at all. Thanks everyone.

 

you can center punch the center of the wheel stud and then use a hole saw just big enough to cut away the nut part and not hurt the wheel

 

jst fire up your flamethrower and go for it

 

Don't guess that frozen lug nut is a left handed thread is it? Did it have a L imprinted in the end of the stud? If it did it was left handed counter clock wise to tighten the lug. And clockwise to take the lug nut off.

The old jeeps had left handed threads on the drivers side wheels. Then sometimes a stud would get broken and someone would replace it with a right handed tread. The young guys at the gas station and tire stores where the ones who had never heard of left handed threads. And they broke a lot of studs trying to do the impossible.

Just wanted to mention just in case this might be your situation.

 

Excellent point, CT.

Pete