I am working on the rear suspension and I have the outer of the rear wheels off - now I have some questions!
Less at MCR believes that there should be inner nuts in between the inner and outer wheels (both Alcoa). There aren't any. Is this factory or did the previous owner do something odd?
Second - any great tips for getting a stuck inner wheel loose?

You have several ways to mount wheels - in your case, I'll only talk about the 2 styles that you have questions about.

1) Hub Piloted: These rims use the hub to center align the rims and only require outer nuts

2) Stud Piloted: These rims use the studs to keep the wheels straight and require an inner and outer nuts on the rears

Question: Do you have left and right handed threads?

Yes: You have a Stud Piloted assembly and your current set up is wrong... Or you don't realize that what you are looking at is an inner nut. Does the studs have a square head? Yes: Remove the inner nut - it requires a special socket to remove.

No: More likely then not, you're ok with what you have and someone changed it over.

You can see a diagram and more info at this link

http://www.bridgestonetrucktires.com/us_eng/real/magazines/00v5iss1/ra5.asp

quote:

Originally posted by chrisW:
Second - any great tips for getting a stuck inner wheel loose?

But only after you have removed the inner nuts!!!

Another couple of rounds of PB Blaster and they are off.
Stud centric but with a very close fit on the hub. Corrision on the hub was holding them in place.

quote:

Originally posted by chrisW:
Stud centric but with a very close fit on the hub. Corrision on the hub was holding them in place.

Does the nuts looks like the one on the left or the one on the right?



If you are have the one on the left, and you have a tight fit, then you have a hub piloted setup.

If you have the nuts on the right, then you have a stud piloted setup. The studs keep them in place via clamping force with the coned style nuts.

Look at your rims - does it have a coned shape for the nuts to fit into it? Or, does it have a flat area?

I am asking these questions because Les has told you it should have an inner and and outer nut on it and I am trying to make sure everything was changed over to the same setup.

My theory, you have a hub piloted setup with the nuts on the left and a flat area for the nuts to clamp down on it. I am basing it on your partial quote ...a very close fit on the hub. Corrision on the hub was holding them in place. and ...inner nuts in between the inner and outer wheels (both Alcoa). There aren't any.

This does sound like a hub piloted setup.

Here is a link to the Alcoa website and it shows both style rims.

Hub Piloted Notice they only show one style nut.

Stud Piloted aka Ball Seat Rims Notice in this one they show inner and outer nuts.

Here is the link for Both styles rims.

They are stud piloted Budd style, I will admit that the description of the Budd "nuts" did confuse me for a while - I kept looking for something that looked like a traditional nut!
Even though these are stud piloted the hub is a very close fit and the rust scale on the hub was preventing tham form comming off once the Budd nuts were removed.

The 3/4" impact wrench comes in handy. good to have 1000 ft lbs in hand!

BTW - the links go to a wheel page - no stud / nut diagram. I searced the web for a while to see if I could find a good Budd diagram - very hard to find!!!

quote:

Originally posted by chrisW:
Less at MCR believes that there should be inner nuts in between the inner and outer wheels (both Alcoa). There aren't any.

In case anyone wants to see what an inner and outer nut looks like on Chris's coach. This picture, supplied by Chris from another post, shows an inner nut on the rear still on the stud. If you look, you can see the square nut drive attached to the inner nut. It is the one that has the biggest stud.

quote:

Originally posted by Bill N.Y.:
2) Stud Piloted: These rims use the studs to keep the wheels straight and require an inner and outer nuts on the rears

Question: Do you have left and right handed threads?

Yes: You have a Stud Piloted assembly and your current set up is wrong... Or you don't realize that what you are looking at is an inner nut. Does the studs have a square head? Yes: Remove the inner nut - it requires a special socket to remove.

With that style, the fact that you need to turn the nuts in 2 different directions to remove is a big clue that you have a Stud Piloted/Budd wheel setup.

quote:

Originally posted by chrisW:
Second - any great tips for getting a stuck inner wheel loose?

This is why I said to remove the inner nuts. I've been on 2 road calls where an owner of an RV couldn't figure out why the wheels wouldn't come off.

By the time I got there, they had destroyed their rim with the big hammer.

quote:

Originally posted by Bill N.Y.:
With that style, the fact that you need to turn the nuts in 2 different directions to remove is a big clue that you have a Stud Piloted/Budd wheel setup

Just to clarify - the lug nut and the Budd nut turn the same direction on each wheel, ie - on the right side of the coach they both go clockwise to tighten (normal) and on the left side they go counterclockwise to tighten (backwards)...at least thas the way mine worked!

I can understand the confusion for the typical RV owner - once you take off the outer wheel the inner wheel looks like it is sitting on the shoulder of a very large stud.

quote:

Originally posted by chrisW:
Just to clarify - the lug nut and the Budd nut turn the same direction on each wheel, ie - on the right side of the coach they both go clockwise to tighten (normal) and on the left side they go counterclockwise to tighten (backwards)...at least thas the way mine worked!

What sounds obvious to me didn't come out the way I meant it to sound. The right side of the coach is as it should be. Righty tighty - lefty loosey.

The left side is backwards from what is considered to be normal.