Alloy Wheels - A Word of Warning

It may be that all other subscribers to this newsgroup may be well aware
of the following information but I certainly wasn't.

It recently became needful to remove all the wheels from my alloy
wheeled VW vehicle. Vehicle was jacked, axle stands inserted and all
fasteners removed. This was the point at which progress ceased! I could
not budge any of the wheels. The solution was to "thrash" the wheels on
their external faces with a rubber mallet in order to break the
corrosive bond between the hub locating boss and the wheel. Corrosion
occupies more space than metal and in this case all clearance had been
taken up by this means. It took considerable force of hammer blows to
release the bond and I was very glad I was not trying to achieve a wheel
change with a puncture, in pouring rain/ snow. It would not have been
possible to remove any of the wheels using purely muscular effort!

All the wheels have now been cleaned up on the locations and a light
smear of lubricant applied against further problems of this nature.

The vehicle was five years old and it was the first time the wheels had
been removed.

Hope this may save someone from the same discovery in an emergency
situation.

Regards