51 replies to this topic

[chris_uk]

cant undo one side, annoying!!! one side was relativly easy the other.. fcuking nightmare! gave up in the end before i round off the heads.

[davestarck]

Question - I purchased a set of these bolts some month's ago from the guy off here via ebay. Went to fit the other day as one of my last little winter jobs. Removed one of the old bolts no problem but it appears that the replacements seem wrong. Not just in overall length but the thread is shorter and they will not tighten before running out of thread!!! Anyone else had this problem. Dave.

[Muncher]

when i took my group buy (this forum) 10.9 bolts to Plans to fit when i was having the nitrons done they refused to fit them, graham got quite animated about it - they fitted the 8.8's instead. Peeved me cos the long ones are fekkin expensive.

edit/ didn't see any body damage which was lucky

What reason did he give?

[JimmyJamJerusalem]

when i took my group buy (this forum) 10.9 bolts to Plans to fit when i was having the nitrons done they refused to fit them, graham got quite animated about it - they fitted the 8.8's instead. Peeved me cos the long ones are fekkin expensive.

edit/ didn't see any body damage which was lucky

What reason did he give?

?????????????

[Sutol]

I was PM'ed by another member of the forum. this is the correspondence. Hi Sutol I saw in your post that Plans wouldn't fit the 10.9 hub bolts, I don't know if you want to post in the open forum why but I'm interested as I intend fitting 10.9's to mine this week. Michael there have been a few threads about hub carrier bolts. One of which organised a group buy of 10.9's some of which i bought as per my post. I have not said anything on open forum about Plans stance until now because i didn't want to upset the person who did the group buy (GB). This was probably a bad move. After seeing those photos i thought i had better throw Plans's opinion into the forum. The reason they gave simply that they would prefer them to bend rather than snap. I think it was Graham that had the concerns rather than John because i discussed fitting the GB bolts with him and he was ok about it. In fact he even emailed me to say that i should check that they were 10.9 and not 12.6. It was only when my car went into them that they kicked off about it. This delayed me getting my car back for 3 days whilst they sourced 8.8 bolts from bell and colvil (ie lotus). The 2 long bolts IIRC were £13 each - i payed £6 (inc of P&P) for all the bolts on the GB. They were adamant about only fitting the 8.8's. I didn't argue with them - they are afterall the experts. Hope that puts you in the picture. Cheers Chris If there are others querying my post I may post this reply to you, if thats OK.

[MIKE_VX]

The reason they gave simply that they would prefer them to bend rather than snap. I think it was Graham that had the concerns rather than John because i discussed fitting the GB bolts with him and he was ok about it. In fact he even emailed me to say that i should check that they were 10.9 and not 12.6.

Hmm - seems like they've changed their mind.....

I called them to ask about this a while ago and they said that the 12.6 ones were too brittle, and the 10.9 ones are OK.

However, they did just say that you're better off just fitting standard ones and replacing them regularly.

[Sutol]

The reason they gave simply that they would prefer them to bend rather than snap. I think it was Graham that had the concerns rather than John because i discussed fitting the GB bolts with him and he was ok about it. In fact he even emailed me to say that i should check that they were 10.9 and not 12.6.

Hmm - seems like they've changed their mind.....

I called them to ask about this a while ago and they said that the 12.6 ones were too brittle, and the 10.9 ones are OK.

However, they did just say that you're better off just fitting standard ones and replacing them regularly.

My car had the bolts fitted by plans in March this year

[Adam_B]

are the bolts hard to change?

[Muncher]

are the bolts hard to change?

In theory no, in practice they can have you swearing at them. You'll need a socket set and the right combination of bits to gain access. Then hope they're not in too tight to undo or that the heads have rounded.

As for Plans, Lotus recommend the 10.9 bolts so that's good enough for me.

[Pooh Bear]

Think it is time for Vauxhall to fess up and accept the fact they need a recall on this. maybe worth sending these photo's to VOSA

I don't think so somehow.
Any modification whether it be a remap or suspension upgrade = warranty void. Vauxhall would laugh at this unless it happened to a standard set-up and to a good few.
As for VOSA, all they are interested in is Government legislations re. MOT rules/criteria.

This aside, thank goodness the out come was that nobody was hurt

Edited by Penny, 05 May 2008 - 08:25 PM.

[Sutol]

are the bolts hard to change?

In theory no, in practice they can have you swearing at them. You'll need a socket set and the right combination of bits to gain access. Then hope they're not in too tight to undo or that the heads have rounded.

As for Plans, Lotus recommend the 10.9 bolts so that's good enough for me.

The bolts that were eventually fitted to my car were the lotus ones and were 8.8 grade. There seems to be a bit of confusion here. i'll give Plans a call if i have time tomorrow.

[slindborg]

12.x bolts are far far far too brittle and will snap faster than the 8.8's there is a lotus upgrade part of 10.9 bolts. I'd guess plans were covering their arses with only fitting 8.8's incase something went wrong with the 10.9's

[ukgulf]

12.x bolts are far far far too brittle and will snap faster than the 8.8's

there is a lotus upgrade part of 10.9 bolts.

I'd guess plans were covering their arses with only fitting 8.8's incase something went wrong with the 10.9's

Mmmmm... the 12.x I got from ebay are deffo going in the bin then...

Edited by ukgulf, 05 May 2008 - 09:18 PM.

[Duncan_F]

Blimey, that's quite worrying, I'd never even heard about this fault before. Glad your OK and like others have said that it was relatively low speed, it's not worth thinking about the consequences had you been traveling much quicker.

[VIX]

Sorry to see this further hub carrier bolt failure. Glad you are ok and hopefully the car shouldn't be too difficult to fix. Courtenay fitted my new 10.9 bolts a couple of months back. Hope it was a wise move ...

[Sutol]

OK i have been on to Graham at Plans. He told me that as far as he knows there has not been a revised specification by Lotus to these bolts. Furthermore, he has worked on new Lotuses and they all have the 8.8 bolts on. His comment was if you go against the spec and there is a problem then who do you sue. He, as a motorsport tuning company does not want to have any blame laid at his feet which is understandable.

I think i will get them changed for peace of mind every other service. This might be overkill but it doesn't bear thinking about if this were to occur at speed. Now whether fitting the 8.8's will give you any warning that the HCB's are knackered before they break I don't know. I remember a photo on this site showing a bolt that had been removed which was bent and chewed which is a lot better than a broken one, i wonder what grade of s/s it was?

[Winstar]

OK i have been on to Graham at Plans. He told me that as far as he knows there has not been a revised specification by Lotus to these bolts. Furthermore, he has worked on new Lotuses and they all have the 8.8 bolts on. His comment was if you go against the spec and there is a problem then who do you sue. He, as a motorsport tuning company does not want to have any blame laid at his feet which is understandable.

Lotus only revised the rear hub carrier bolts to be 10.9, the fronts are still 8.8 (see below).

However there have been occassions of the front ones failing, although it's less likely due to the lower forces and the fact that people remove more of the camber shims making the torque transfered to the clamp load more effective.

Information from the 111 S2 using steel uprights

The original A111W7145F M10x50 bolt rear hub carrier is grade 8.8 and the service manual states torque 45Nm or 33lbft (NOTE some S2 parts manuals list Rear suspension part #5 as A111W1745F which is probably a misprint)

In 2004 Lotus issued service bulletin 2004/08 which revised the part number to A117W7212F with a new 10.9 grade specification to be torqued to 68Nm or 50lbft for motorsport use.

The front bolts A111W7155F and A1117W144F are not affected and remain 8.8 grade and 33lbft torque.

[simsy]

Looking at your original photo of the sheared bolts, I can see that they were loose for a while as there is significate wear on the sides of the bolt. The threads are worn down on the sides showing side ways movement for many hours.... The bolt will shear if it is loose. Was new thread lock fitted last time the bolt was moved? Which bolt is best is open (Lotus factory recommendations will be the most balanced), but any bolt that is tight and in good condition will not fail unless you hit a kurb or bump very hard and do not replace them.... (This last bit is just my opinion) Many members here regularly do 3 figure speeds, just think what could happen if the failure was at these speeds? Horrific.... ************I'm glad you got away with it matey..........***************** -------------------------------------------

Edited by simsy, 06 May 2008 - 09:08 AM.

[VXTlover]

I had concerns about this problem and suggested to Top Gear Automotive that I should change them for the 10.9 bolts. They recommended 12.9 bolts and so I went with them. £8 for the lot. No problems...so far.

[Winstar]

Which bolt is best is open (Lotus factory recommendations will be the most balanced), but any bolt that is tight and in good condition will not fail unless you hit a kurb or bump very hard and do not replace them.... (This last bit is just my opinion)

Not strictly true, it is only if the clamp force in the Joint, caused by torquing the bolt, is greater than the load on the joint.

The clamp force for a given torque can vary quite a lot due to different factors the 2 main ones in the hub bolts are the friction on the threads and the number of interfaces introduced by the camber shims, as they cause a loss of clamp force due to embedding.

Edited by Winstar, 06 May 2008 - 01:21 PM.