Did my used car dealer risk catastrophic failure with these undersized Hub Adapters?

[jmc215]

Hello friends,

Reaching out with a serious issue I could use your advice on

I recently bought a clean '99 Limited with 250k miles from a used car dealer in Portland

To increase the sell price they added a 2-3'' suspension lift, trimmed the flares, and added huge new mud tires (not sure what size exactly)

Today I took the wheels off to replace the CVs and LBJ's and noticed something really concerning

They installed hub adapters to keep the tires from rubbing, and the nuts connecting the hub adapters to the main studs are seemingly half threaded. Look at these pics. You can clearly see 4-5 exposed threads in each nut.

Im not an expert here but this seems extremely dangerous and risking a catastrophic failure. Am I overreacting? Is this is normal?

Roommate who worked at a tire shop said this looks extremely sus. He also said potentially theres a chance this is OK if its a certain type of lugnut or if there are enough threads engaged.

Not sure what to do here. Can anyone add context?

[EDIT]: I am now realizing these "nuts" are probably very long and a few exposed threads might not be a huge deal. I just did not want to mess with anything as a precaution before deciding what to do next. I'll probably take a nut out tomorrow and inspect the length.

If they are indeed the wrong size, my plan is to ask the dealer to finance a new set of 4 Spidertrax 1.25 inch Hub Spacers

Toyota Hub Centric Wheel Spacer Kit

If this is normal, how will I know the torque specs to reinstall? Just tighten hard as I can?

APPRECIATE ANY AND ALL FEEDBACK, THANK YOU

 

[spartacus]

You have the right idea take off one of the nuts. I have seen nuts on spacers that show a few threads. lots of folks run spacers for clearance issues. But spacers need to be properly torqued. Won't hurt to ask the dealer to compensate you for spidertrax. Ask the dealer what brand of spacer they used and go with that company torque spec. you should look up the tire brand and size and rating e.g is it c or e rated. It will 'give you an idea how heavy the tire is. Also wouldn't hurt to post a pic of the vehicle.

 

[Humble Leader]

check to see if they are extended lug nuts. you may need some of those. there's an old thread here where folks have the same issues

Thread Engagement on Wheel Spacers | Tacoma World

I don't know what brand of spacers those are. the dealer I doubt will agree to pay for spider trax, it's probably not worth your time to argue that the install is unsafe. personally I don't like spacers but if that was my vehicle and I had to get spacers, I'd get high quality ones and just pay for them out of pocket. I wouldn't be comfortable running a set up like in the pic you posted, others might have no problem

 

[JZiggy]

Don't know much about wheel spacers but do know a bit about fasteners. Bare minimum thread engagement is 3 threads, ideally 2x that. What you have shown there, unless those nuts are coupling nuts with 20 threads, definitely does not look OK.

 

[Endlessblockades]

Those don't look very confidence-inspiring. Have you pulled one of those lug nuts off to see how much thread is captured inside? What are they torqued to? On my Spider trax the nuts are nearly flush with the end of the studs. If you need to run spacers I would not use anything but Bora or Spider Trax - both are made in the USA. Use thread-lock and torque them to spec (good instructions will have this spec - I believe it was in the 75-85 range - but check yourself), then check that they held torque after the recommended period. I was super careful with my own setup and have full confidence in it. I'll still get proper rims one day that don't need them, but I needed the clearance and didn't want to wait. Edit - I still had a couple pics on my phone....

 

[DreadPirateJon]

Im running those same spacers and had the same concern. Ended up replacing the lug studs with ones for the rear that are a few threads longer and can be ordered pretty cheap from rock auto.Link to Rockauto

Heres the length comparrison

And once installed