Which torque wrench?

I dont think it really makes a rats ass on things like wheels.

If you want to worry about whether you have 82 lb-ft or 80 or some crap
like that, you are in the outer limits..

If you want to calibrate the freaking wrench, then do it. It normally is
NOT
necessary.

Tighten the freaking lugs according to specs, and go on your date.

You can drive yourself nuts with trivia. Is 82 good enough? what if it is
really 80.4??
Get a life, put your wheels on, and boogie.

HLS wrote:
> I dont think it really makes a rats ass on things like wheels.
>
> If you want to worry about whether you have 82 lb-ft or 80 or some crap
> like that, you are in the outer limits..
>
> If you want to calibrate the freaking wrench, then do it. It normally
> is NOT
> necessary.
>
> Tighten the freaking lugs according to specs, and go on your date.
>
> You can drive yourself nuts with trivia. Is 82 good enough? what if it
> is really 80.4??
> Get a life, put your wheels on, and boogie.
>
>

agred, but I do think that using a torque wrench of some sort is
important on wheels, especially alloy ones. Some cars it doesnt' seem
to matter, and others, if you have uneven torque on the lug nuts it'll
vibrate like mad.

nate

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"Nate Nagel" > wrote in message
...

> agred, but I do think that using a torque wrench of some sort is important
> on wheels, especially alloy ones. Some cars it doesnt' seem to matter,
> and others, if you have uneven torque on the lug nuts it'll vibrate like
> mad.
>
> nate

I agree, Nate...
Even torque is probably more important than absolute torque...And you
CAN warp rotors starting with uneven and excessive torques.

I guess my point is that you dont need accuracy to the second decimal place,
for most things. Plus/minus 2% would be almost laboratory accuracy,
plus/minus
5% is great for a lot of things, and plus/minus 10% is perfectly acceptable
in many cases.

What is "accurate enough"? There is no real answer, I guess. I would like
to see
a test that compared the accuracy of common toque wrenches, right off the
shelf.
Most of us do not calibrate our torque wrenches... We could check them with
simple
dead weight measurements if we wanted to.

Somebody who is not experienced with torque values and wrenching in
general needs to be led cautiously and they need a proper torque
wrench for wheel lugs because of the inherent danger of over or under
torquing this part.

For 82 ft/lbs a wrench that goes to 150 ft/lbs will suffice. You will
then be using the middle of the range of the tool. This is an
important asspect of torque wrenches. A wrench that goes to 150 ft/lbs
should not be used above 125 (approx figure) or maybe 115.

Ever have a wheel come off when driving? I've not but I do my own.
I've known people this has happened to, driving fleet cars. A friend
of mine had one of his rear wheels pass him as he was pulling into the
airport. They were close enough the passenger still made their plane.
Another time, same friend, had a front wheel come off and he was able
to pull over driving on the brake rotor.

If you think you can handle it I'll give you the shade tree method:
Lug wrench that came with the car. Tighten the lugs in a criss cross
pattern using, 1st go around "1 grunt", 2nd go around "2 grunts", 3rd
and final stage "3 grunts". This should work just fine "most" of the
time.

BTW even if using a torque wrench, the nuts should be tightened in 2
or 3 stages. Using a criss cross pattern. i.e. tighten one skip one
tighten 2 skip one all the way around till each is done. Then with
increasing force the process is repeated till final torque is reached.

For this item you are attaching with 30 ft/lbs. 2 grunts will be fine.

disston

When I was in the military, our torque wrench bible was Air Force
Technical Order 32B14-3-1-101, "OPERATION AND SERVICE INSTRUCTIONS,
TORQUE INDICATING DEVICES"
http://www.robins.af.mil/shared/medi...070108-274.pdf
(about 200 k)

The USAF rule on snap action torque wrench settings is that you may
use a wrench from 20% to 100% of its maximum torque. For instance, the
legal working range for a wrench marked 10 - 100 ft-lb is from 20 to
100 ft-lbs. But a 30 - 100 wrench is okay to use from 30 to 100. The
quality control inspectors will nail you with a violation if they
catch you using a wrench outside its allowable range.

For the screwdriver type wrenches, the legal minimum is 25% of max.
The only time I used one of these was for electronic jobs, like
torquing circuit board hold-down screws.

Another rule is that snap action wrenches have to clicked a few times
before you use them "for real". That's because the release point can
be erratic the first few times if a wrench has been sitting for a long
time. In one tool crib where I worked, there were some old sockets
(one of each drive size) welded face down to a small steel plate which
was bolted to the counter. When they issued a torque wrench, you
exercised it there before going out to the job.

All the measuring tools such as micrometers, torque wrenches, etc.
were on a periodic calibration schedule. A lab on the base took care
of this. The worn out ones that could no longer meet spec got sold at
auction. Think about that when you see government surplus tools on
eBay.

--
Paul Hirose >
To reply by email remove INVALID

"Paul Hirose" > wrote in
m:


>
> Another rule is that snap action wrenches have to clicked a few times
> before you use them "for real". That's because the release point can
> be erratic the first few times if a wrench has been sitting for a long
> time.



This is an interesting comment, and intuitively it makes sense. I once
dissected a Sears Craftsman click-type wrench to see how it worked.
http://www.tegger.com/hondafaq/torque_wrench/index.html

The only thing I can see that might affect torque from the wrench sitting
for a period of time is "stiction" resulting from lubricant accumulation
about the moving parts. Seems to me that working the wrench a bit before
actual use would redistribute the lubricant, helping to normalize
"stiction" from use to use. Your thoughts?



> In one tool crib where I worked, there were some old sockets
> (one of each drive size) welded face down to a small steel plate which
> was bolted to the counter. When they issued a torque wrench, you
> exercised it there before going out to the job.
>
> All the measuring tools such as micrometers, torque wrenches, etc.
> were on a periodic calibration schedule. A lab on the base took care
> of this. The worn out ones that could no longer meet spec got sold at
> auction.


And what was "spec"? By "spec" I'm assuming you mean "tolerance". My
Craftsman has a 4% tolerance built-in from new, which is fine for general
automotive use. I suspect your precision aircraft-grade wrenches were
probably within 4% by the time they were rejected.



--
Tegger

disston wrote:
> Somebody who is not experienced with torque values and wrenching in
> general needs to be led cautiously and they need a proper torque
> wrench for wheel lugs because of the inherent danger of over or under
> torquing this part.
>
> For 82 ft/lbs a wrench that goes to 150 ft/lbs will suffice. You will
> then be using the middle of the range of the tool. This is an
> important asspect of torque wrenches. A wrench that goes to 150 ft/lbs
> should not be used above 125 (approx figure) or maybe 115.
>
> Ever have a wheel come off when driving? I've not but I do my own.
> I've known people this has happened to, driving fleet cars. A friend
> of mine had one of his rear wheels pass him as he was pulling into the
> airport. They were close enough the passenger still made their plane.
> Another time, same friend, had a front wheel come off and he was able
> to pull over driving on the brake rotor.
>
> If you think you can handle it I'll give you the shade tree method:
> Lug wrench that came with the car. Tighten the lugs in a criss cross
> pattern using, 1st go around "1 grunt", 2nd go around "2 grunts", 3rd
> and final stage "3 grunts". This should work just fine "most" of the
> time.
>
> BTW even if using a torque wrench, the nuts should be tightened in 2
> or 3 stages. Using a criss cross pattern. i.e. tighten one skip one
> tighten 2 skip one all the way around till each is done. Then with
> increasing force the process is repeated till final torque is reached.
>
> For this item you are attaching with 30 ft/lbs. 2 grunts will be fine.
>
> disston

I still use a torque wrench on all wheels and I don't consider myself
inexperienced. Of course I have had both a BMW and a Porsche which were
very sensitive to just about any kind of imbalance... they're always
quivering a little bit it seems.

nate

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