Technical Stainless steel fasteners!

I've dealt with the SS covered lug nuts on my own stuff since the late 60's , never had a problem until I dropped a car off to have new tires installed & they used an impact on the nuts , they were 18 years old & I'd always used a hand wrench on them , not only did they screw up the caps , the overtightened them as well .

 

In the rust belt I use never seize or grease, if you have ever had a nut freeze to the stud and then had the stud turn in the rotor or axle you will use some lube from there on out. Also throw out the tin capped lug nut sooner or latter you’ll have the cap spin on the nut. I replace with SS nuts.
Dan

 

It is the same in the field of UHV (Ultra High Vacuum). Most all of the assemblies were built in a clean room environment. The screws and bolts were 316 or 18-8 and Ag (Silver) plated but not the nuts. This has been done for decades. There are vendors that sell plated fasteners or they can be sent to a plating shop.

 

I was to, but use it anyway. I put a small amount on the threads near the wheel. I also use only Gorilla lug nuts on the new style aluminum wheels where a portion of the nut goes into the wheel….the outside of the lug nut shank gets a little too.
ALL of the fasteners on my Bonneville roadster get anti seize and nylon locking nuts.

 

Type 316 SS will resist rust well, its used on boat rigging for ocean going boats. If your going to machine it use 316L, "L" is a type of lubricant added to the alloy for machining purposes. If your going to use SS fasteners you need to add lube to the threads to prevent galling. White lithium is a good lube.

 

Actually, you can't willy nilly just put anti-seize on stainless steel. It must be nickel based, otherwise you are creating a dissimilar metal scenario.

Additionally stainless can become the most noble metal and turn the rest of the part into a sacrificial anode, so caution there.

Stainless is not rated like grade 5 and grade 8, so be careful.

The stainless that is ferrous is called duplex, get your wallet out!

 

The silver plating is amazing. Do you a vendor name? We bought from the OEM and could not buy direct.
Dan

 

I’ve had good luck with white grease, I’ve used copper anti seize with ok results, nickel is better. Dissimilar metals can cause a problem.
Dan

 

The "L" in 304L or 316L designates low carbon. 0.03% max. vs 0.08% max. for 304 or 316.

 

The silver plating will withstand some heat as well but will tarnish. It will also last for many assembly cycles. We regularly baked SST vacuum chambers to 200 deg. C. mainly to desorb water vapor from the interior surfaces but that gets way off topic here. I don't know if they will sell retail but we bought a lot of fasteners from UC Components. There are others.

It's always a good idea to check fasteners by screwing them together by hand. You will find manufacturing flaws before they become a problem no matter what you are building.

 

I use a bit of oil on wheel nut threads and a little white lithium grease on the shoulders.
I started doing this when I came across stock wheel nuts galling the threads and shoulders of the nuts.
I haven't had a wheel fall off yet.
If using never seize or to a lesser degree, oil or grease, on a thread the torque value should theoretically be reduced. However wheel nuts are so often way over-tightened by garage monkeys that they obviously can handle a lot of over-torquing.

 

I put a drop or two of light oil on wheel studs