so. a good friend of mine told me his friend is acura/honda/nissan/porshe certified technician. so i take my car to him to get 60k and my springs installed. he does all the work for 200. which i thought was decent. i go to pick up the car and it looks amazing. i get on the road and all i feel is a massive vibration. im thinking that its my alignment and balance that is out of line. after driving from Baltimore to Washington DC this lady horns at me and says HEY YOUR RIGHT REAR WHEEL IS ABOUT TO FALL OFF, ITS WOBBLING ALOT!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! so i pull over and sure fucking enough, the wheel is amost off. 3 lugnuts are gone. i jack up the car. tighten two of the remainding lugnuts and get to a empty parking lot. i jack the car up again and take the wheel off. one stud is snapped in half. two others are bent. at this pt, i decided to make sure all nuts were tight. the rear left were ALSO loose. at this pt not only was i pissed but also in shock because both rear tires could have potentially fell off and caused a major accident anywhere between bmore and dc. my girlfriend and myself got very very lucky. im going today back to the guy so he can put in new studs.

so, even though this is such a simple thing, make sure your lugnuts are tight before you leave any shop.


EDIT: i forgot to mention that the drop looks INCREDIBLE!

 

im glad that your fine and nothing serious happened. it would have been a mess if your wheels would have feel off. my dad had the same problem about 6 years ago when he got some tires put on and the guys forgot to tighten his lugs. so when he got on the freeway his wheels were shaking so he pulled over to checc and all five lugs were loose. he went bacc and bitched at them.

 

Glad noone was hurt!!

Get your wheels balanced and make sure that they are not bent out of shape in the centercore....you'll probably not going to be able to really see it. But, when you get it balanced...the tech will let you know! I had 2 of my 18"rims bent in the centercore and a rim repair shop said they were not fixable b/c the centercore's were bent.

Good Luck!!

 

that is why i only take my car to a shop where i can watch them work on it. I dont care how long it takes.

 

I had a situation like this happen to me in a rental delivery van. It was one of those white stock econoline vans, and appearantly the rental company didn't check out the vehicles before renting them out... My brother kept hearing a loud clanging from the back right tire. Turns out the 4 of the 6 lugs had fallen off into the the aluminum hub cap and were rattling around in there.

We had driven this van on the highway AND it is a rear wheel drive vehicle which is double trouble to be sure

 

Glad you are ok and no one was hurt. Things always seem to happen to you. I guess with service you also get what you pay for. I would not let the your friends, friend work on your car again, even if her offers you a good price. I would wonder if your springs are even installed correctly. I had something similar happen to me at Radely Acura, I got the tech fired and it took 2 months to get everything straight. It was a royal pain. Since then I do everything myself that I can.

 

I would raise hell with the guy!

This happened to me once when I had my tires changed. I was on one lug by the time I pulled over. They suspended the guy as a result of the incident.

 

damn thats crazy. you actually took ur car back to that guy? i would have taken it somewhere reputable and mad the guy that fukd up pay for it.

 

update: im not going to take it back to the same guy. im just going to have it done and send him the bill. i dont really trust the guy anymore. it was such a moronic mistake as well. this guy is acura/honda/porshe/nissan certified AND HE WORKS AT A PORSHE DEALERSHIP which is the kicker.