[DeTomaso] Pantera near disaster

[Will Demelo]

I've driven a car with loose lug nuts before. I could hear alot of noise and "feel" something going on. It would take some time before it would break studs off. Did you hear anything, other than the 2 loud noises, before the studs flew off?
W
  ----- Original Message ----- 
  From: boyd casey 
  To: Will Demelo 
  Cc: MikeLDrew at aol.com ; detomaso at realbig.com 
  Sent: Saturday, August 21, 2010 8:33 PM
  Subject: Re: [DeTomaso] Pantera near disaster


  The studs were (are 12mm x 1.5) the other side as well as the two front wheels are perfect. . The alignment was done on a late model hunter machine that uses a computer and lasers and gives a before and after print out and the alignment specs were close to perfect. 
  My inclination is toward  untightened lug nuts. . The alignment tech asked me for the lug nut lock key when I dropped off the car. according to Hunters web sight there is a "wheels off" alignment that is sometimes done. The alignment tech said he put shims in to align the back wheels. The final straw is that I have directional wheels. On Saturday when I bled the brakes (i had two people helping me) I noticed when I put the first rear wheel on that I put the right wheel on the left side. I noticed it and mentioned it to my friends (helpers) and switched the wheel to the correct side. My two friends clearly remember this episode too. When I took my car off the tow truck the wheel that was bad was the left rear and it had the right side tire on it. So someone at the alignment shop appears to be covering their ass. I have know way of proving it. I wasn't present when they did the alignment. The shop is very popular and has a wait to get in. Since it is 45 miles from my house I dropped the car off their on Wednesday and picked it up an Thursday afternoon. So I think some one screwed up and didn't tighten the lug nuts properly. I don't think their is any thing wrong with the design in fact I think is is superior to the stock design. the bearings are better. The axles are stronger, the cv joints are mechanically  superior to half shafts. The process to access the rear wheel bearings is simpler the removing the rear bearings on the stock risers and does not require a press. Another improvement this design has over the stock design is that a failure of a half shaft ( which is non existent in this design ) but the failure of a CV joint will not result in the loss of a wheel. You can completely remove the CV joint and the wheel will remain in place. I am not an engineer but I don't think Mike  knows enough about this design to draw any factual conclusions about it being inferior or superior to the original design and there is no conclusive evidence that this incident was the result of a design flaw. I believe it is allot more likely that the failure was the result of some human error in the assembly ( like lug nuts not being tightened) When the replacement parts come I will reassemble the car and go over everything with a fine tooth comb.
  Boyd


  On Sat, Aug 21, 2010 at 7:54 PM, Will Demelo <wdemelo at cogeco.ca> wrote:

    Mike has a good suggestion with looking at the other side. It may give you clues as to what is going to happen.
    W
    ----- Original Message ----- From: <MikeLDrew at aol.com>
    To: <boyd411 at gmail.com>; <detomaso at realbig.com>
    Sent: Saturday, August 21, 2010 7:15 PM
    Subject: Re: [DeTomaso] Pantera near disaster




      In a message dated 8/21/10 15 56 52, boyd411 at gmail.com writes:



        The alignment tech claims he did not take the wheels off so I
        have no way of knowing what the cause was. If anyone has any suggestions
        I
        would be interested in hearing any theories.



      How about dramatically underengineered and wholly unnecessary replacements
      for perfectly good stock parts?   I would never, ever take a chance with
      ever running those new hubs assemblies even before this episode, but now? One
      would have to be suicidal to do so, I think.   Read what you wrote:

      " I could have been killed or the wheel could have come
      completely off and the damage could easily have been well into the
      thousands
      of dollars."

      I have been very skeptical about this whole project from the start; when I
      looked at the parts, they seemed pretty, but there doesn't seem to be any
      true science behind them.   To me, it looks like somebody just started with a
      bunch of material and started whittling until the pieces that were left
      resembled Pantera parts.

      Now, I can't honestly claim that I know the level of engineering analysis
      that went into the design of the stock components, and I will admit that the
      stock axles leave a bit to be desired, in the long run.   But there's no
      question that the stock components are superior, by orders of magnitude, to the
      home-made, cobbled-up affair that nearly killed you today.

      Curious--what does the other side look like at the moment?

      Mike (SO glad you learned your lesson the (relatively) easy way!)

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