Post #352561 by Mai Tai on Wed, Jan 2, 2008 4:36 PM

Okay, here's the deal. I have a 1971 VW Bus (a camper with the pop top), and one of the lug nuts on the passenger side front wheel is totally frozen on. It's a 5 lug wheel. Nacho and I were able to get two other frozen lugs off with an electric impact wrench, but this last one is extremely stubborn. All the electric impact wrench did was round off the corners. I've tried saturating the lug nut and post with that super duper PB penetrating oil, and tried using a lug wrench with a long 3.5 foot heavy pipe cheat, and it still wouldn't budge. I even hit the lug nut with a butane torch - granted, the torch isn't as hot as a welding torch (and I don't have a welding torch), but I did leave the butane torch on the lug for a good 5 minutes, and I tried that three times in a row for 5 minutes each time, so you think that would have heated it up enough? Maybe not.

Anyways, I'm getting desperate to get this lug nut removed, so I can move the van to a different location. I have to make a path for workers that are coming next week to remove an enormous monterey pine tree in our back yard. I already have a replacement tire and rim wheel ready to pop on as soon as I can get the other wheel removed.

I even tried removing the entire wheel assembly, drum and all, off of the spindle. Nacho and I removed the center cap off of the spindle, and I removed the locking retaining ring off and pulled out the bearing cup assembly. But it seems like the drum must be frozen on to the spindle or something - I can not get the wheel to come off the spindle either!

The back story on the VW is that it was my nephew's, and he pretty much gave it to me (or should I say abandoned it) when he finished art college out here in the S.F. Bay Area, and moved back to Texas. It was sitting the entire time he was out here going to college. It ran on his first day out, and it was back-firing heavily, so it sounded like a timing issue to me. He decided to take the entire engine apart, and put it back together, but he's an art student and not a mechanic, so he didn't know what he was doing, and then the engine didn't run at all after he was finished. :roll:

I give you this back story because firing it up and driving on a flat tire isn't an option. Also, the tire has actually started to rot/disintegrate on that wheel. All the other tires are fine, and are holding air.

So, what are my options? We tried pushing the bus, even backed my car up against it to move it, but all to no avail - it just simply wouldn't roll with that rotted flat tire. Is there some way to snap off the lug stud? I have an air compressor, but it's a small twin tank one for a nail gun. Should I use a sawz-all to cut off the lug nut? The lug nut is made of a soft type of material, (maybe it has some lead in it?), so cutting it off someway somehow would not be out of the question. But what ever way I remove it, it needs to be soon! I need help, and pronto!!!

"It's Mai Tai. It's out of this world." - Victor Jules Bergeron Jr.

[ Edited by: Mai Tai 2008-01-02 16:39 ]