Torque Wrench

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In most of our videos, you'll notice us giving you torque specs. This is a specification of the rotational force that needs to be applied to a piece of hardware in order for it to secure as it was intended to. In order to achieve this torque spec we use one of these. These are click-type torque wrenches. There are several others, but most commonly you'll find these because they are the easiest to use. Now the biggest difference here is going to be their ranges. This goes from 20 to 200 inch pounds, which can be converted to foot pounds, but if you're using this wrench you're generally doing a very, very small amount of torque.

Our 3/8 drive goes from 5 to 80 foot pounds. This is usually good for things like brakes and light torque engine components.

The big one starts at 10, goes to 150. We use this for axle nuts, wheels and tires, and a variety of other high torque applications. If this isn't enough, they make something called a torque multiplier, which is actually a reduction gear box that would sit into the 1/2" drive with another 1/2" drive on the other end to multiply the torque here by a specified amount. Or you can get a higher-ranged torque wrench.

Now all of these will be adjusted the same way. The specifics are going to be individual to whichever particular torque wrench you have, but the same concepts will apply. We're going to use our 1/2" drive just because it's the biggest and the easiest to see, but the process would be the same on the others.

Now on our GMC Sierra that we have in the shop now, the manufacturer specifies 140 foot-pounds to torque our lug nuts. Lug nuts are probably one of the most important torque out there, as they hold your wheels on. You'll generally notice there is a lot of specific measuring equipment in most tire shops just for making sure the torque on your wheels and tires is perfect.

Incorrect torque can cause vibrations, failure in wheel bearings, ABS faults, tires falling off, and a variety of other issues. To find 140, ours goes in increments of 10 to this straight center line. When the top edge is flush with the line that has the torque we want ... See our 10 kicks down here. It goes flat. We have 0 designated with a line. We're at 10 foot pounds now. Each tick mark on this particular model is 1 foot pound, so we would be going 11, 12, 13, 14, 15, 16, 17, 18, 19. When we hit 0 again, we're lined up with the notch on our 20. Since we're going to 140, we're going all but the last peg, so we'll turn this all the way up.

Now these torque wrenches work off of springs, so you don't want to torque it past that 150. Will the handle spin past it? Yes, but you've lost your center line so you're not going to know exactly where your torque is at. They stopped it at 150 for a reason. This spring is not designed for this to torque more than 150 foot-pounds. Now that we've got it set at 140, there's a little thumbscrew at the bottom here. You'll want to tighten that up. Now I can't move the sleeve while I'm tightening. Another important thing when torquing obviously is to have the right socket, 21 in this instance, and to torque in the correct pattern. Now some things do not have what's called a torque sequence on them, which would be steps torque. Say if these were to be done at 80 and then 140, that's not the case on these, but they do have a torque sequence and the fact that they need to be tightened in a certain order in order to make sure that this is torqued down flat, straight, and even.

These are universal, so on this a 6-lug wheel should be torqued in two triangles. By that I mean we'll do the first triangle, skip across the hub, and then do the second triangle. This concept carries over to 8-lug wheels with squares, 10-lugs with stars. 5-lugs are done in a star-type pattern. Then you just skip over on a 4-lug wheel. In this case, we'll make our triangles.

Now one thing you want to make sure you do is torque smooth and even. You don't want to jump on this or jam at it, just nice and steady. When it clicks, let off. See we crossed over there after we made our first triangle. You get the idea there.

Now one thing you see a lot that is not okay, I'm just going to lower the torque for the sake of demonstration. This is only 70 foot-pounds. Very unlikely you'd torque a wheel to this, but just to show you with a lot of people do. You'll see the guys at tire shops and other places put a wheel on. Got a make sure that wheel's tight. I don't want it to fall off. There's no need for multiple clicks. One click and release and you're at the correct torque.

This rapid clicking, you can be moving while you're clicking and not even realize it, thus over-torquing the wheels and making different torques on each individual lug, or whatever type of hardware you're tightening. Another bad habit, click and I just want to be sure, push through it, and then let off. Again, you've over-torqued it and you do risk damaging the internal components by putting all that force on it once it's already clicked and reached its limit.

Another bad habit with torque wrenches, again, these are precision-calibrated with springs inside of the mechanism. You see this a lot. I only ever use my 1/2" drive torque wrench to do the lugs on my tires, so I set it to 140 and I leave it there. It's not okay. It leaves tension on the spring. The spring will weaken over time and thus throw off your torque. If you want to make sure that you're really getting the number you're after, when you're done torquing, undo that thumbscrew, back that pressure all the way off down as low as it will go. There's no tension on our spring, thus it's not going to wear out and fatigue, causing premature failure and inaccurate readings. Whether or not you tighten up the lock screw is up to you.

Ours sit inside of a molded case so there's really no risk of these turning. Some people like to keep them in their car for rotations and just to check for peace of mind. If that's the case, you'll probably want to snug this up just so this torque wrench in the back of your car doesn't come out of adjustment.One more important thing to note about your torque wrench is it is not a breaker bar. Yes, it's 1/2" drive and it's a long wrench, so you'd get some good leverage, but again, precision instrument, springs that are specifically calibrated, using it as a breaker bar or dropping it or leaving it with the spring compressed for a long period of time are all things that will turn your torque wrench out of proper calibration. For best results, be sure to have it professionally calibrated at least once every year or 5,000 cycles.

Another style of torque wrench is called beam type. This here works where the drive stays steady and the head pivots, so as you torque it, this beam will move and display the correct reading in either foot pounds or Newton meters. Now it won't give you that click click that tells you you've reached the torque. You'll have to watch it and manually set it there.

However, the advantage to these is a click type torque wrench has that spring we talked about where if you drop it, bang it, leave it tight, you need to get it professionally recalibrated. While it is something you can do yourself, it involves a lot of complicated and precise measurements and equations, whereas this one, if I drop it and it goes off of zero, all I have to do to recalibrate it is just bend it until it rests back at zero, and my beam type torque wrench is just as accurate as it was before I dropped it. Some of the advantages to a beam type torque wrench is they're usually quite a bit cheaper than a click type. You don't have to worry about the calibration. However, the downside is that you have to manually watch this and be very precise with your eye. You need to be able to see this. You need to have room to swing it. It's a little bit bigger and bulkier with this gage on the bottom and this second rod coming off of the top. But in a lot of cases, a beam type torque wrench can be used just as easily as a click type.

This bolt is approximately the size of something you would find in something like, say, a caliper guide pin or guide bolt. We'll use our 13mm socket and ratchet and tighten it down like we normally would. We're going to get it close. The torque wrench is a little bigger and bulkier so we're just going to use this to get it down quick. Then the average bolt this size is probably torqued to somewhere in the 20 foot pound range. I got that down close and I'm going to use my beam style torque wrench first. I'll make sure it's set at 0, put it onto the bolt, and you'll see as I'm rotating here, that gage moves. Want to get right over it. When I get to 20 foot pounds on the mark, we'll let off.

The last torque measuring instrument we have here is what's called a torque angle gage. The way this works is your set onto your bolt, set this little leg against something solid so the base doesn't rotate, only the top does with the dial. As you tighten it, you'll get that set to 0. As you rotate and tighten the bolt, this gage will move and tell you how many degrees you've rotated the bolt. This is generally used for higher torque applications like head bolts or head studs, usually use a torque angle gage because they are what is called torque to yield. The bolt is tightened to a certain specification and then a certain number of degrees are added to stretch that bolt once it's already tight and get the maximum clamping force out of it. The downside to this is that bolt is no longer reusable after it's been removed because stretching it again can weaken or break it. Now that I've got it torqued to 20 foot pounds, let's say we wanted to add 10 degrees of torque angle to it.

I'll put a 13mm socket on, install my torque angle finder and rotate the base until it's against something sturdy. We'll tighten it down kind of like my vice here so you can see when I turn this, that's not going to move. I'll put my ratchet in and I'll just put a little pressure on it so I know that it's butted up against my solid object. Set it to 0, then turn it until I hit 10 degrees. We're done.

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What's up, guys? I'm Andy from 1A Auto. Here I have this half inch torque wrench we sell at 1aauto.com. It's great if you have the torque lug nuts down or any other front end components. It comes with this nice case. It goes from 25 foot pounds all the way to 250 foot pounds. If you need this torque wrench, click the link in the description and get yours at 1aauto.com.

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