Proper Torquing Tips & Techniques (as Suggested by Forum Members)
By Joseph Coelho

Ensure you are accurately tightening your S2000's fasteners to the manufacturer's precise torque specifications with these tips and techniques.

 

Because after any oxidation or rust occur torque specs are still accurate.

 

If you use a click type torque wrench to verify the torque of an already tightened fastener, if it clicks without the fastener moving at all, if you don't actually tighten things more than they were at the start, you can't be sure of the fastener torqued value.

Example. Someone at a tire shop tries to use an air gun to zip the lug nuts to just barely on, so they can finish up with a torque wrench. They set torque wrench to 80 lb/ft, and it nicely clicks for each nut. They call it good and car goes out.

Only they are clumsy with the gun, and each lugnut is actually torqued to 150 lb/ft.

When wrench clicked without tightening, that should have been their cue things were too tight.

So don't be like that clueless newb at the tire shop if you use torque wrench to check fastener.

 

Not sure I get this logic - if the person with the air gun tightened the lugs to the correct torque of 80lb/ft and the guy with the torque wrench (say set at 81lb/ft) it would also click off without tightening. So there is no cue at all as to the torqued value. The breakaway torque of a fastener is higher (sometimes significantly) than the torqued value. The breakaway torque might be 85 or 100lb/ft on a lug that has been secured to 80-lb/ft - so it is not possible, or really advisable to check the torque of a fastener with a torque wrench.
This is my understanding anyway but I'm an accountant, perhaps a qualified mechanic or engineer could comment if I have it arse up.

 

 

I must not have described it properly. The one and only tire shop guy working on the car TRIES to use the gun to wind the lugs down to just barely seated, to save himself the effort and time of doing it manually. But since he's not very adept with the gun, he really ends up knocking them tight at like 150 ft/lbs.

Then he uses the torque wrench to finish up like his bosses are always so insistent he do. He marvels at his seemingly unique ability to somehow always get the lugs to the exact right torque using the gun, since every time he checks them with the torque wrench, they're already 'perfect'.

 

I have no idea if tire shops use torque sticks on their impact guns but it's a great thing to have and would avoid the scenario Car Analogy describes.

 

A bunch have nifty clutch packs in their guns for this purpose. Gun to 60 ft/lbs, torque wrench for the rest.

My little AC Delco impact has this feature even.

 

The tire shop in question has torque sticks. The shop insists employees follow that up with the torque wrench. The problem is torque sticks are a sort of tuned entity, and varying air pressure or other factors of the gun can have them apply more torque than they are rated for.

A torque stick that limited to something super low, like 20 lb/ft, that even if it were way off due to whatever factors would still be way lower than the typical 80 lb/ft of your typical lug nut, that was then followed up with a torque wrench that was sure to turn some number of degrees before clicking, that would work.

But then if the idiot forgets, you have wheels falling off and lawsuits. So its easy to see why they want to err on the side of warped wheels and warped rotors.

 

Torque stick is a torsion spring it will bend before it's rating, and any fastener should be finished with a torque wrench.