Locking wheel nut removal in N20 on a Ford Focus

New customer called to say they had a set of locking wheel nuts on their Ford Focus that they needed removing.

They had just had a tyre fitted at a well-known high street fast fit centre and the new tyre had gone down.

They had tried to remove the wheel but the locking wheel nut key was damaged where the locking wheel nut had been gunned on.

The customer had managed to pump the tyre up and returned to the fast fit centre but they said there was nothing they could do. This is where we ride to the rescue.

The customer found us on the internet and called the office to arrange an appointment. We had just finished a job in N10 so it is a short drive to N20.

Arrived at the customers address and looked at the key and the locking wheel nut. The key had been sheared and shards of metal had been left in the locking wheel nut.

Pulled the metal shards out of the locking wheel nut key and started on the nut. We carry special tools that can either form the shape of the locking wheel nut key or they wind onto the nut and remove them.

The tool that forms the shape of the locking wheel nut key was the one for this job, started work on the locking wheel nut and after 10 minutes it was off. As the key had been damaged the other 3 locking wheel nuts would also have to be removed. These each took just under 5 minutes each indicating how tight the first one had been gunned on.

Well now we have to fix the original problem (the flat tyre) that the customer had. Jacked the car up and removed the wheel. Straight away I could see the problem, the tyre had not seated correctly on the back of the wheel so it was leaking air. Pumped the tyre up until the tyre popped and seated on the wheel, set the pressure to the correct level and then reattached the wheel to the car tyre. Tightened up the wheel nuts and finished off with a torque wrench.

You might think that the customer is now missing 1 wheel nut from each wheel, he would have normally but luckily he had the 4 normal nuts that had been removed to put the locking wheel nuts on. Put the nuts on to each wheel and then tightened them up with the torque wrench.

If you have had problems with your locking wheel nuts and maybe the key is damaged or lost call Hometyre on 0800 783 93 10 and we will come to you.

We can also fit new tyres at the same time