Loose Rim

G'day G-Z,

I had a similar thing with my camper. Managed to go from Melb to Bright & back, then from Melb to Avoca & back. Took the wheels off at home to have a general look at the brake set-up, put it all back together & headed off to Eildon. Checked the wheel nuts at Yarra Glen, all tight, got to Bonnie Doon and something felt a bit wierd. Checked the wheel nuts again, 4 of 6 on the LHS were almost off and the other 2 were loose. Replaced the studs when I got home and have had no probs since. Still can't explain it.

You will probably find that the rims and hubs are/were new and had paint on both mating surfaces and in the taper for the wheel nuts.
Even though they were done up tight the flexing as you drove would allow the paint to be removed and then the nuts are loose.
Alternatively are the nuts the correct ones for the rims? There may be a slight mismatch between the taper on the nuts and the taper in the holes in the rim.

Did you put CRC, WD40 or similar onto the studs before tightening the nuts? Not a good idea to use that stuff on wheel studs, better to use the proper antiseize compound in the little tubes.
Klaus

Had the same thing happen to me a few years back on our near new camper trailerjust as we hit the Great Ocean Road. Heard a bang then looked in the rear view mirror to see the camper standing up vertical before coming down with a thud.The tyre had come off and then got caught up in the mudgaurd kicking up the trailer as it passed underneath giving the whole family one hell of a shock.Managed to get a couple of nuts from the other side onto the spare wheel and limped back to Airey's Inlet caravan park and then picked up some new studs in Geelong next day and fixed it back up. This usually happens only on the left hand side as when the trailer brakes it tries to unscrew the nuts off the studs, on the right hand side the braking tries to tighten the nuts .Lots of earlier model trucks used to have the studs on the left hand side have a left hand thread for this reason. Was a real bugger if you didn't know as you were actually tightening up the nuts if you treated them as right hand thread .From memory they had a slash across the stud to indcate left hand thread just as nuts on gas fittings have a nick out of them to indcate the same.I think the paint theory may be right as I have not had any problem since with wheel nuts on the camper trailer although I have to admit to checking them qute often in the first 12 months of use.

Paint is a problem, specially with the white wheels. Studs and nuts should be done to tention DRY never with crc/anti seeze ect.
Cheers
Charlie