Torque Wrenches

[Bianco2564]

Be very careful what you believe on the web, I was looking for info on my BMW car, found a copy from a trusted BMW forum I read.

Later found another copy on there, same format and the prop bolts which I was interested in was 20Nm different.

I'd urge you to find a helpful Honda dealer.

 

[Bender]

On 25/10/2022 at 19:26, Bianco2564 said:

Be very careful what you believe on the web, I was looking for info on my BMW car, found a copy from a trusted BMW forum I read.

Later found another copy on there, same format and the prop bolts which I was interested in was 20Nm different.

I'd urge you to find a helpful Honda dealer.

 

I've never used torque wrench on a propshaft ever, now I'm not saying you shouldn't I'm just saying I've never, and that goes from plodding diesels to def not plodding petrol interesting things. 

 

As an apprentice in the dark ages a torque wrench was never mentioned unless it was engine internals, you actively got minus points if you selected the wrong size spanner though. 

[Bianco2564]

11 hours ago, Bender said:

I've never used torque wrench on a propshaft ever, now I'm not saying you shouldn't I'm just saying I've never, and that goes from plodding diesels to def not plodding petrol interesting things. 

 

As an apprentice in the dark ages a torque wrench was never mentioned unless it was engine internals, you actively got minus points if you selected the wrong size spanner though. 

It was drummed into us to use a torque wrench throughout my apprenticeship, it was at an old school garage where things were "done proper". Then moved to race engine building where everything and I mean every nut and bolt had to be torqued up, again another old school company. Failure to do so meant the sack.

This has stuck with me as the correct way of doing things and I torque up all key parts of my cars and bikes. I don't use a torque wrench on everything, I'd like to believe I have a good feel for non critical fasteners.

You have got to use an appropriate wrench to tighten a fastener, so why not a torque wrench, anything else is guesswork. 

 

As for the propshaft, I've seen the consequences of a prop coming loose at speed.

[Bender]

7 minutes ago, Bianco2564 said:

It was drummed into us to use a torque wrench throughout my apprenticeship, it was at an old school garage where things were "done proper". Then moved to race engine building where everything and I mean every nut and bolt had to be torqued up, again another old school company. Failure to do so meant the sack.

This has stuck with me as the correct way of doing things and I torque up all key parts of my cars and bikes. I don't use a torque wrench on everything, I'd like to believe I have a good feel for non critical fasteners.

You have got to use an appropriate wrench to tighten a fastener, so why not a torque wrench, anything else is guesswork. 

 

As for the propshaft, I've seen the consequences of a prop coming loose at speed.

Yup it happens and it wasn't put on right

Prop bolts are more about sheer, like I said I wouldn't advise not to do it but it's not something I would think twice about and have done many track days and hill climbs in said cars and never had anything depart company from anything. 

 

My apprenticeship was in hgv garage, we had tight, tighter and a length of scaffold on on an inch drive bar. 

[Bianco2564]

1 hour ago, Bender said:

Yup it happens and it wasn't put on right

Prop bolts are more about sheer, like I said I wouldn't advise not to do it but it's not something I would think twice about and have done many track days and hill climbs in said cars and never had anything depart company from anything. 

 

My apprenticeship was in hgv garage, we had tight, tighter and a length of scaffold on on an inch drive bar. 

Yes the tech didn't follow the correct procedure and the result was the prop came loose. When it cost 100s of thousands £ to get a car to the grid, there can be no second chances if something has not been put together correctly. Sponsors get very upset when their car stops. 

Lets hope HGV garages have improved their standards from scaffold tight, no fun seeing a 44 tonne truck bearing down on you knowing it may have been assembled that badly. I was nearly taken out by a loose truck wheel when driving in the USA. 

It's a binary choice, tighten it up correctly or just tighten it.

 

 

Back on topic, my point was to say don't believe everything you read on the net. I've seen a lot of statements on different websites that have clearly been plagarised from the language used, so the disinformation spreads. Always check your source.

 

 

[Tiggie]

3 hours ago, Bianco2564 said:

Lets hope HGV garages have improved their standards from scaffold tight

 

They have. Nowadays that equates to about 10 ugga duggas  

[fastbob]

Stop , think ....what is the PURPOSE of tightening the axle bolt ?  Is it to exert a certain level of pressure on the spacers that fit between the bearing centres ? Or is it to just stop the thing coming undone " By itself "  ?  Well let's put it this way , I have never used a Torque Wrench for anything except engine building and I have never had a wheel spindle fall out of a bike . I just stick a wrench on the nut , tighten it right up until it's rapidly getting progressively tighter and then give it an extra graunch that hurts my hand a bit .

[Bianco2564]

Like I said , you can tighten it correctly or just tighten it.

Clearly OP wants to do the former with his research on the web and youtube, so it would only be right for us to tell him the correct procedure. To say just tighten it up, there are variables which we don't know that would affect the outcome.

OP could weigh 8 stone dripping wet and be using a 19mm spanner or he could weigh 20 stone with the strength of a bear and use a 3 ft breaker bar. A torque wrench will cancel out any variable. In particular OP sounds like a biking noob with probably little mechanical experience so let's start him off on the right foot and do maintainence correctly. When he's an old hand like us with many years experience, yes he can probably tighten it up by feel.

As for the wheel spindle nut, the specified torque is is to clamp the rear axle assembly to the swing arm to prevent it moving from the forces from the chain and braking so not a small job to do.

 

[fastbob]

4 minutes ago, Bianco2564 said:

Like I said , you can tighten it correctly or just tighten it.

Clearly OP wants to do the former with his research on the web and youtube, so it would only be right for us to tell him the correct procedure. To say just tighten it up, there are variables which we don't know that would affect the outcome.

OP could weigh 8 stone dripping wet and be using a 19mm spanner or he could weigh 20 stone with the strength of a bear and use a 3 ft breaker bar. A torque wrench will cancel out any variable. In particular OP sounds like a biking noob with probably little mechanical experience so let's start him off on the right foot and do maintainence correctly. When he's an old hand like us with many years experience, yes he can probably tighten it up by feel.

As for the wheel spindle nut, the specified torque is is to clamp the rear axle assembly to the swing arm to prevent it moving from the forces from the chain and braking so not a small job to do.

 

That's the job of the adjusters . A Torque Wrench is a dangerous tool in the wrong hands . Use one on a partially damaged but serviceable thread and it won't be serviceable any more . It's no good saying " But it didn't go click " if you've already felt it go tight and then go loose again . This all stems from kids being given PlayStation instead of Meccano . 

[bud]

The 2019 CB125 is a different bike, with a different engine.

I'm sure a phone call to a Honda dealer would give you the information. Or why not pop in to the dealer you brought it from if local.

[Tiggie]

32 minutes ago, Bianco2564 said:

When he's an old hand like us with many years experience, yes he can probably tighten it up by feel.

 

Well said. This is something I do need to remind myself of from time to time. Often I just expect people to know or be able to do something for the simple reason that I can do it and I'm not that clever 

[Bianco2564]

33 minutes ago, fastbob said:

That's the job of the adjusters . A Torque Wrench is a dangerous tool in the wrong hands . Use one on a partially damaged but serviceable thread and it won't be serviceable any more . It's no good saying " But it didn't go click " if you've already felt it go tight and then go loose again . This all stems from kids being given PlayStation instead of Meccano . 

So if you undo the rear wheel nut, the axle won't move? . The forces from the chain and braking will start to move the axle because of the clearances in each mating part and the clearance will get bigger and bigger from the constant reversal of acceleration and braking . The adjusters move the axle to tension the chain correctly and set wheel alignment, the spindle nut keeps it all clamped up in the correct place.

If your damaged but "servicable" thread cannot hold the torque its designed for then it's not servicable, it needs replacing.  Using a torque wrench will show this up, doing it up by feel will probably result in the fastener being under tightened  and you are just ignoring the problem.

Perhaps so we don't hijack this thread any more, start a new thread , Torque wrenches? Tighten stuff up correctly or guess.

 

[fastbob]

6 hours ago, Bianco2564 said:

So if you undo the rear wheel nut, the axle won't move? . The forces from the chain and braking will start to move the axle because of the clearances in each mating part and the clearance will get bigger and bigger from the constant reversal of acceleration and braking . The adjusters move the axle to tension the chain correctly and set wheel alignment, the spindle nut keeps it all clamped up in the correct place.

If your damaged but "servicable" thread cannot hold the torque its designed for then it's not servicable, it needs replacing.  Using a torque wrench will show this up, doing it up by feel will probably result in the fastener being under tightened  and you are just ignoring the problem.

Perhaps so we don't hijack this thread any more, start a new thread , Torque wrenches? Tighten stuff up correctly or guess.

 

I'm not just talking about axle nuts . I'm talking about the assumption that using a Torque Wrench makes everything guaranteed to be perfect . 

[Tiggie]

When starting out I should of used a torque wrench on several occasions to make sure I didn't over tighten certain bolts. A cracked sump plug hole  and more than a few stripped wheel nuts on cars to my shame 

 

 

[Bender]

9 hours ago, Tiggie said:

When starting out I should of used a torque wrench on several occasions to make sure I didn't over tighten certain bolts. A cracked sump plug hole  and more than a few stripped wheel nuts on cars to my shame 

 

 

Interesting, 99% of tyre fitters use a rattle gun, then do the obligatory click click with a torque wrench which is obviously going to click, I've stopped and helped many a stranded person who has been completely unable to remove wheel nuts yet I've never come across one that was stripped. 

 

Did you drive around in a Fleet of old fiat 127's  

 

 

[Tiggie]

It was more a case of me believing I should tighten up lug nuts as much as possible for fear of the wheel coming off!!  You can put a surprising amount of force on a nut with one of these

 

 

 

tight.... tight....tighter ...creak ...loose  

 

Same with oil sump, I thought it had to be really tight to stop oil leaking out!   I learnt that lesson the hard way!! 

 

 

As a newbie starting out if I had used a torque wrench I wouldn't of had to spend money replacing parts or buying helicoils    Nowadays I have a (slightly) better idea of what I'm doing so it wouldn't be as necessary.

[billy sugger]

I used torque wrenches on all the internal bolts when I rebuilt the 500, and on things like the water pump and all sprocket retainers, clutch nut, stator, etc, but the cover bolts were all done by feel. By using the appropriate size ratchet drive I know if I can't tighten them any more they are tight enough 

[Bender]

3 hours ago, Tiggie said:

It was more a case of me believing I should tighten up lug nuts as much as possible for fear of the wheel coming off!!  You can put a surprising amount of force on a nut with one of these

 

 

 

tight.... tight....tighter ...creak ...loose  

 

Same with oil sump, I thought it had to be really tight to stop oil leaking out!   I learnt that lesson the hard way!! 

 

 

As a newbie starting out if I had used a torque wrench I wouldn't of had to spend money replacing parts or buying helicoils    Nowadays I have a (slightly) better idea of what I'm doing so it wouldn't be as necessary.

I snapped one of them taking or trying to take off a wheel nut, neither the nut or the thread stripped. 

[Ub7rm]

pff torqueing is for amateurs.  Bolt tensioning is where its at ...

 

But seriously, need to be careful if you are applying grease or not.  VAG specifically state not to great wheel bolts for example and to torque to ~ 120kNm.  If you apply any grease you need to reduce the torque applied otherwise you can yield the bolt.  The difference between a dry bolt or a greased one could be between 30 to 50% less torque to generate the same clamping force.  

[Stu]

4 hours ago, Ub7rm said:

pff torqueing is for amateurs.  Bolt tensioning is where its at ...

 

But seriously, need to be careful if you are applying grease or not.  VAG specifically state not to great wheel bolts for example and to torque to ~ 120kNm.  If you apply any grease you need to reduce the torque applied otherwise you can yield the bolt.  The difference between a dry bolt or a greased one could be between 30 to 50% less torque to generate the same clamping force.  

 

Recently I saw a great illustration of what happens with torque with clean, rusted and lubed nuts and bolts. 

 

Rusted was too loose due to extra friction and lubed was too tight 

 

This is why people strip sump plugs etc 

[Bender]

23 minutes ago, Stu said:

 

Recently I saw a great illustration of what happens with torque with clean, rusted and lubed nuts and bolts. 

 

Rusted was too loose due to extra friction and lubed was too tight 

 

This is why people strip sump plugs etc 

Like @Tiggie  

[Stu]

3 minutes ago, Bender said:

Like @Tiggie  

 

I don't read his posts........

 

 

[billy sugger]

To be truthful, who could ever say a man torques too much

[Gerontious]

*click

[onesea]

On 28/10/2022 at 22:13, Bender said:

As an apprentice in the dark ages a torque wrench was never mentioned unless it was engine internals, you actively got minus points if you selected the wrong size spanner though. 

I was once told the reason for the different length of spanner’s was so that you could not over tighten your average bolt by hand if spanner used properly.

I was also taught to think what bolt was doing, and what gasket was in place. Sump plugs only hold oil with very little pressure as open to atmosphere, however washer is copper so if it leaks it’s probably the washer, but a little tweak might stop a drip.

Axle nuts on bike act as clamps so maybe should be torqued until you get a feel.

my trophy has concentric wheel arrangement, people have been known over tighten the clamp bolts and break the swing arm .  Just use correct size Allen key as supplied and you won’t.  Use Allan socket on large socket spanner and you have to be careful..