Do You Use a Torque Wrench

[Lloyd]

Ummm... they're easy to come across. Anywhere that sells half decent tools should have them or at least have them available.

Bear in mind that they should be calibrated every so often

[Bling]

I got mine from Mitre10mega, was sub $100 so relatively average, but I don't build engines and the most i've done is the likes of flywheel / clutch sort of stuff. It's not economical to spend $500 on a decent one for DIY imo.

Looks like this: http://www.trademe.co.nz/business-farmi ... 169791.htm

[Dell'Orto]

Bear in mind the cheap chinese ones usually cant be calibrated, so are worthless after awhile.

[DVSMOTORSPORT]

I use them pretty much all day everyday. Wheel nuts, fly wheels, crank bolts, anything to do with the cambelt etc. Bolting seats in or hanging doors stuff like that I just do by hand or rattle gun. But anything that could come undone and have my ass kicked for then I use one as an insurance policy basically.

Dont spend over 200 on a torque wrench. You can buy good ones from partmaster, extreme etc for about 120-150.

[eskimo]

Yeap, use them all the time become rather quick at setting them having to use them in rally services.

[RS13]

Talking with the GF's grandad (retired aircraft engineer); he reckons an overtight bolt is every bit as bad, if not worse, then an undertight bolt.

Every single bolt, screw or nut we do up at work has a torque value, the torque wrenches we use range from less than 10in/lb up to one about 6 feet long.. the gas turbine shop over the fence has a couple of torque multipliers as well, into the thousands of ft/lbs.. serious pieces of kit! So yeah, working on aircraft pretty much everything gets torqued, but the cars.. not so much. You tend to get a feel for the correct torque anyway after using them almost daily.

[Mr Revhead]

[quote="RS13"You tend to get a feel for the correct torque anyway after using them almost daily.[/quote]

The guy that did the engines for the team I was in could do that. Whiz them up by hand, and put the torque wrench on them and he was within 2-3 clicks everytime

[BZG Wagon]

I don't do stuff on the car enough to have even a remote feel for things. Snapped a few smaller bolts (i/c, thermostat housing etc) on occasion.

I think I'll have to invest in one - anything to look for or avoid? Cheaper is better in my case, it has to obviously work and last, but it won't get a beating.

And out of interst; how would you calibrate one?

[Lloyd]

Cheap, good build quality and accurate.... how many of those points did you require?

Generally you send it to a torque wrench calibrater guy

[Grrrrrrr!]

make sure it covers the range you need. eg Teng 3/8th drive torque wrenches come in several flavours including 5-25Nm & 20-100Nm.. the first one will only really be useful for the small stuff, the second one covers most of the bolts you are likely to encounter, but you might need something bigger for crank pulleys, or something smaller for the really small stuff (10mm head or smaller) which are usually not so critical.

[Dell'Orto]

And out of interst; how would you calibrate one?

In Palmy we used to send them to Fieldair for calibration, so quite likely other aircraft maintenance places can do it

[DVSMOTORSPORT]

If your using NM mostly, try to look for one with NM as the main unit of measure, I bought a 1/2" one recently and the NM range goes up in units of 14 I think it is, so its 14 28 32 blah blah, makes you think about setting it instead of just a quick setup, I regret buying it now

[Lloyd]

14, 28, 32? I don't think I'd trust that one

[DVSMOTORSPORT]

Its T&E, its a good one, just the increments are sh*t house

[MAGN1T]

You can make your own calibration test setup using a horizontal pivot, lever and weight on the end.
As for torquing wheel nuts, that's what a rattle gun is for. You don't see pit crews using torque wrenches swapping wheels in the middle of a race.

Steve

[Mr Revhead]

No, you see them using extremely expensive hand built guns made for the purpose. As well as locking rings and parts designed for the purpose.

[BZG Wagon]

As for torquing wheel nuts, that's what a rattle gun is for. You don't see pit crews using torque wrenches swapping wheels in the middle of a race.

I'm sick to death of tyre shops doing up wheel nuts too tight with their rattle guns. About six months ago we struggled to get the nuts off my mates skyline - ended up standing on my breaker bar to get them loose and they groaned terribly.

Very pleased my regular shop uses a rattle gun to get it most of the way and a torque wrench to finish it off.

[DVSMOTORSPORT]

Haha, yeh those rattle guns are highly calibrated/expensive peices of kit and probably worth more than your whole tool box.

Im the only one at my workshop who torques wheel nuts, I decided I would test one of the other guys wheel nuts that were just rattled up, turns out they were done up to 170nm, I only do them to 90nm

[Mr Ree]

A torque bar is an easy option if you use a rattle gun for wheels.

Each cars lug nuts have a torque spec and you just use the corresponding extension on the rattle gun to ensure its to spec.

[Grrrrrrr!]

How accurate are those torque bars tho?

Still not entirely sure exactly how they work, but I'm guessing its something to do with being thin enough that X amount of torque will twist it more than the rotation of the drive spigot each impact... But surely that depends on the mechanics of each individual impact gun?