KC "Fun"

So Tuesday I had all-day training in KC around the plaza area, and I live about 3 hours away so I drove up morning of and planned on driving home that night. Makes for a long day but one and done. Drive up was enjoyable, beautiful flint hills scenery and nice weather. Training let out around 5:30 so I wanted to get headed right home, especially because it would probably rain most of the way. In my hurry I wish I'd have done the walk-around the car. You can see where this is headed. I hop on the highway and about the 35-40 mph mark I hear this horrible THUMP THUMP THUMP THUMP THUMP. Great, I'm thinking flat tire. I pull over, walk around the car finally coming around the back last, only to see 2 lugs missing, the rest so loose they could fall out I jack up the car, take the wheel off, inspect lugs for thread damage. Nothing there to see really other than some scratches around the head. Pull the wheel off looking for thread damage or worse elongation, both of which there are no signs of. So I decide well I'll just put it back on as best as I can making sure I place the lugs strategically making sure there's no movement or torquing and go back to the parking lot to see if my lugs are there. The car vibrates a bit still, so I'm thinking all the worst. Amazingly there are the bolts on the ground where I parked for the day. I had to get back home that night for appointments the next morning so I had no choice but to jack it up and put the handy space saver spare on (ha which screams I HAVE A SPARE TIRE ON - bright red ) and drive 45 mph all the way home. Long day made LONGER. Took it to a trusted tire shop yesterday with my desperately needed new rear tires (BTW, 3 rear wheels/tires in a 996 is a full load haha) and they inspected my wheels with a more trained eye, agreeing I'm fortunate not to have any damage. Throw on the new tires with a Hunter Road Force balance and I drive away. Luckily I hop on the highway, NO vibration, take it up to a nice stress-relieving 95 with smooth sailing just like it was parked. Back in business baby! Only thing I can think of is someone was being an @$$ for no good reason or they wanted my wheels. I didn't have any problems the whole way up and 2 lugs lying in the parking lot couldn't happen right if you tried. All I can say is I'm happy there's no damage to myself or my car and relieved all I lost was 60 bucks for mounting and balance. Time to buy wheel locks.

I'm glad things turned out to be okay at the end. I thought all Porsches came with wheel locks.

People suck....glad it wasn't so bad for you.

That could have had a horrible ending, glad it didn't. Which tires did you buy?

Indeed I lucked out. I went with Sumitomo HTR Z III, great value for the price and its not like I'm doing anything crazy with my street driving. Decent grip in the wet conditions too which is proving useful right now. Fairly quiet too. It's always nice going from my blizzaks to the Sumitomos because they're so much quieter on the highway. Which I see that's what you're using too.

Odd that would happen in the Plaza area and during the day. Where exactly was it? Any security cameras at the place you were parked? Obviously someone was messing with it - that's the only explanation for the lug bolts being there. Do you have stock wheels or some really expensive aftermarket wheels?

It really is odd. I work at Merrill Lynch and we had some joint training with American Century on Main St, 4500 Main to be exact. Their parking lot is just next to the road so anyone walking by could get to my car. Now I parked in a way that unless you were at just the right angle, you couldn't see my car (in a back corner behind an escalade). Maybe that made it a little easier to justify for their work because they thought they'd be more hidden. TBH, I was just worried about getting back. If I had to spend a bunch of money and time and effort getting things fixed or had something catastrophic happen, you can bet I'd be following up. At this point, yes of course I'd like to catch the perpetrator but I don't have the time/energy/hatred (haha) to do so. Seriously tho, who does this? My wheels are nothing impressive, just stock carrera 5 spoke arctic silver. But to someone who needs a buck I guess they see Porsche = $$$. Lol you just happen to carry the tools to whip out and take some wheels just in case ya see something ya like??? (course I guess I have the tools to service my own wheels, if I REALLY felt the desire to steal someone's wheel I could probably get it done lol). Maybe I don't have the criminal *****. By the way, I do make it up to KC fairly often whether that be for work or something else, and at some point I'll meet up with some PCA members or something. Our PCA has an event planned to be in Paola on the 16th for a trolley ride to some wine tours. Not terribly far from KC.

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FIFY. Stop by and see us on your next trip - 119th & I-35 in Olathe. Back to your incident. Man, that's a pretty swank part of town and a high-security type building. My law office used to be right across the street at 4435 Main. Henry Bloch (the "H" in H & R Block) and Jim Stowers (Am Century founder) used to park in that lot when I officed across the street as the building on the north side of the Am Century twin towers used to be the H & R Block HQ. That building is probably the highest priced piece of real estate in KC. My point is that you might want to contact American Century to report it. I just cannot fathom someone trying to swipe the wheels off your car there. Sounds like a deliberate act of sabotage. Maybe just a sick practical joke or teenagers doing some sort of initiation. But you could have been seriously hurt. It should be looked into.

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^^^This! +1! I thought they ALL had wheel locks!

I would start by checking KCattorney's alibis for that day. He may be replacing his 996 one lug nut at a time.

Someone probably started taking them off to steal them and got to the wheel lock on the 3rd one and gave up. Glad it didn't turn out worse.

I thought it may have been caused by an over torqued air ratchet, I had a TR6 and the wheels were over torqued.. ruined a wheel because it yanked out the wheel studs.. but doesn't seem to be the case here... the description of the area where the car was parked seems highly unlikely - and considering Triumph engineering to P is also well.... unlikely- Good to hear you're okay !