Hubs on spindle

[Cleve]

Having a devil of a time screwing the big nut on the front spindles. Using a 12" breaker bar I can turn the nut about 5 or 6 revolutions on the driver side. . After that its almost impossible to tighten the nut any further using the breaker bar. The passenger side using the same breaker bar I can only get about 3 turns , then it is extremely tight. The nuts seem to have a pink inside coating which seems to be making the nut more difficult to go on. I was wondering if this is normal. Thinking maybe my big impact wrench would screw them on. I dont want to screw this up . Would the impact wrench be a problem or would it be ok to use. Any help would be truly appreciated.


Just contacted tech support. Dave said absolutely impact wrench is 100% recommended . Will try tomorrow. and thanks so much for all the ideas and suggestions. All were very helpful.

[FLPBFoot]

Front spindles? No not normal. I got mine to go on 4 or 5 turns by hand and then easily tightened up with a ratchet before pulling out the large torque wrench to finalize. I don't recall any "lock tight" type stuff on the treads. I believe the nuts have a form of retention method on the outside edge as they are single use. Not sure what they call those kind of special spindle nuts.

[Gizmosrcool]

Ditto on what FLPBFoot wrote.

Put a little grease on the hub and it should slide right on. Then a socket should get the nut on and snugged up. This should not be hard. No impact is needed.

A big *** torque wrench gets it to final spec. While it’s harder, the size of the wrench gets it done, and no need for any breaker bar or extension on the torque wrench.

The nut is single use. Hope this helps.

Tom

[Cleve]

Tom,
The hub went on the spindle easily with a few taps. My problem is the nut wont go on the spindle threads. My breaker bar is longer than I said. Its more like 17 in. long. After a few quarter turns I can literally pick up the car with the breaker bar. I am starting to think they sent me the wrong nuts. Do you know if the spindle is an 05 mustang spindle. If it is I can go to the Ford dealership to see if they can solve the problem. I am starting to think they could have sent me the wrong nut. Or that heavy duty coating inside the threads of the nut is preventing it from going on. When you can pick the car up with the breaker bar while tightening a nut something isnt right.

[edwardb]

Tom,
The hub went on the spindle easily with a few taps. My problem is the nut wont go on the spindle threads. My breaker bar is longer than I said. Its more like 17 in. long. After a few quarter turns I can literally pick up the car with the breaker bar. I am starting to think they sent me the wrong nuts. Do you know if the spindle is an 05 mustang spindle. If it is I can go to the Ford dealership to see if they can solve the problem. I am starting to think they could have sent me the wrong nut. Or that heavy duty coating inside the threads of the nut is preventing it from going on. When you can pick the car up with the breaker bar while tightening a nut something isnt right.

Stop right now cranking on it and figure out what's going on. Before you damage the threads on the spindles. No way it's that hard to get the nut on. Even with thread locker or whatever already on the threads. The nuts should go on with just medium resistance (or less) until the final torque setting. Which does require some effort to get to the torque spec. But not until then. I've only used the nuts that came with my kit. But according to my records, are Mustang 94-04 (SN-95). M24-2.0 threads. Widely available if it comes to that.

[MB750]

Cleve

I had the exact same issue on my build. I could turn the nut maybe 1/2 turn by hand, then it just hit a wall and took 150 ft-lbs the whole rest of the way. It was almost like the nut was an interference fit. I got it, but damn...

[Gizmosrcool]

Cleve. The nut has a dimple or something similar on the end in a few places and once you start it, it should get started, and then go on fairly easy with a socket. Medium effort. The last part torquing it down is a b*****. U get at it. That is my experience. I agree with EdwardB that it should not be that hard.

The nut was a weird dingy black nut. Unusual and only two of them. I searched on rock auto and found this. It looks like.

184997

Good luck. Tom