dentedfender Posted December 21, 2005 Share Posted December 21, 2005 so i was driving to school today and my drives side tire fell off going about 25 mph. The tire and wheel are trashed so i put on my spare and drove 15 miles back home not going over 50, 3 miles from home i hear and feel a clunk then the drivers side tire locks up at 45 and i put on the brakes and make it to the side of the road safely. The tire is pushed back into the fender the strut is at an angle like this \. I havent had a chance to look it over yet but im thinking when the tire fell off it landed on the bolt/nut that holds the knuckle onto the bottom of the a arm. And it weakened it severly causing to it to break which would let the knuckle go off of the a arm and sending everything back into the fender. Or the trailing arm that goes to the a arm is bent and same with the a arm. So I am wondering if this has happened to anyone before and what you had to do to fix it . And if the strut is going to be ok to use, is the mouting area for the strut going to need to be sectioned out of anthor car and welded in to fix this. I know there isnt much info on this yet but i need to get a head start so i cna get this fixed. Any help would be great, ill probally have pics up tomorrow. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
[HTi]Johnson Posted December 22, 2005 Share Posted December 22, 2005 Yeah a couple weeks ago, my same wheel came off and went under a big truck towing a backho(e) excavator. Needless to say the wheel is toast. My car landed on the balljoin stub and completely ground it down to the control arm. Pretty much welded it to the arm. So I put my spare on and continued to work. So It could be your ball joint...just got so fubar'd it failed. Or your strut rod (trailing rod) could have failed...pics would be nice. But if no pics are available, I'd say look at your ball joint stub first...see if it didn't come out of the arm Then if it didn't, see if your control arm is bent...but I think you just cam out of the stub. Tell us what you find. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
EYE_WHY Posted December 22, 2005 Share Posted December 22, 2005 Just curious, but how does a wheel come off?? Forget to tighten lug nuts? It always makes me nervous when I hear of people whose wheels randomly roll off and I start thinkin' about what would happen if one of my wheels came off . . . Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
[HTi]Johnson Posted December 22, 2005 Share Posted December 22, 2005 I think I didn't torque my wheels down. I worked on it on a Saturday and drove all day Sunday, then monday, it fell off. Made for a great Monday. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
mudduck Posted December 22, 2005 Share Posted December 22, 2005 Just curious, but how does a wheel come off?? Forget to tighten lug nuts? It always makes me nervous when I hear of people whose wheels randomly roll off and I start thinkin' about what would happen if one of my wheels came off . . . Thats what I was wondering. How does someone loose a wheel? I guess if you don't tighten your lugnuts, they will fall off eventually. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
zyewdall Posted December 22, 2005 Share Posted December 22, 2005 Thats what I was wondering. How does someone loose a wheel? I guess if you don't tighten your lugnuts, they will fall off eventually. You can melt end of the steel axle off. I did that on a 24' box truck -- right front wheel bearing went out, and the whole right front wheel/hub/disc brake melted off and took of on it's own. Luckily we were only going about 30 on a flat highway with a wide shoulder when it came loose (5 miles from the end of a 4000 mile trip). Thing handled almost the same skidding on the axle beam as it did with two front wheels.... The thing we were most worried about was the glowing red wheel starting a forest fire as it bounded away on its own. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
dentedfender Posted December 22, 2005 Author Share Posted December 22, 2005 Yeah well the story behind it is i bought it for 100$ with the clutch out and brakes and the exaust was shot so i spent 200 on brakes and a clutch made an exaust out of my buddys old exaust. So i was rushing cuz i wanted to drive it and only tightened down the lug nuts with the wrench when the car was still up in the air, and the tires wernt touching the ground. I pulled it into the garage to weld up the rest of the exaust and was so excited by the way it sounded i drove it and forgot to crank them. So yeah thats the story behind it but i got it home today and the bolt connecting the knuckle to the a arm was broken. Ill get pics of it tomorrow when i have it all jacked up. So do you think all i need to get for parts is a new knuckle and cv and tie rod end? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
dentedfender Posted December 23, 2005 Author Share Posted December 23, 2005 here it is now alot worse looking than it was but getting it off the trailer messed it up. So i know that im gonna need a new cv shaft and bottom ball joint, fender, wheel, tie rod end, and the hub part that connects to the brake rotor. Im pretty sure i dont have to get a new knuckle because can't i replace the bottom ball joint, the one thats broken in the picture. Let me know what you think ill need and if anyone has any of these parts. Thanks Jacob. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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