dawgfanjef

Had my 2005 rx 330 in for new tires. My wife handled the pickup, dude said the wheel locking lugs weren't long enough to actually contribute to securing the wheel. handed her 4 locks and the key, and left a lug on each wheel blank. I scratched my head, and bought replacement lugs.
2 questions,
1. Is that true, only 4/5 lugs are actually used to hold the wheel and the other is a lock/
2. I am not really concerned about somebody stealing a wheel of her, anybody else just put a regular lug on to make life simpler later?

spinellib

I never heard this before. If it's the "right" locking lug for the application, then it does its job as a lug nut in addition to providing security.
Most good thieves have the tools to remove those security lug nuts, anyway.

Plus1RX

+1. Never heard of this. Consensus on other car forums, e.g. Porsche Rennlist, is that the main thing these locks do is to prevent the owner from getting a wheel off when the key is misplaced. I've removed all of mine. If it's in an area where wheel thefts are prevalent that might be another story, but I would hope the Lexus security system would trigger if our cars were jacked up?

Plus1RX

More good input on this:

MattRX

The key on my Highlander broke after almost 20 years, forcing me to hammer on 12-point sockets to change over to my winter set of tires/rims. After I swapped to normal lugs, not having to deal with the headache of having to reach into the storage compartment to get the stupid key out was invigorating. Needless to say, they're not worth it and they can easily be removed by anyone with a set of 12-point sockets and a hammer. Was the first thing I took off my RX350 when I got it. Also, your mechanic will thank you if you don't have these. When I was working at Toyota, these things were nothing but a huge PAIN in the behind when the customer lost the key and we had to pull out the master set to remove them.

01LEXPL

iTrader: (10)

1. No, not true, the locking nut does the same job the other 4 do.
2. Yes, get rid of it and get a regular lugnut (dealer only, aftermarket are ****, and much worse quality)

I usually wait until one of them breaks, extract it, swear a bunch. Then toss out the set along with locking key