Do you carry a torque wrench
 

Anyone ever carry a torque wrench?

I think I would if I could have find a decent one, small and light enough, yet suitable for fasteners that require a bit of muscle. Until now I have gotten by with blue locktite and taking it easy.

torque wrench
 

After 40 years in the garage.
The torque wrench is included in in my arms/hands

Feeling......

I have done but realised that if I really need one I can usually borrow one so don't any longer.

I was toying with the idea of an electronic one if I felt I needed one, but to be honest, I probably won’t bother.

All i take is an adjustable spanner !!:oops2:

I just took a look at the service manual for the Tenere 700. In the torque setting section. The torques ranged from 7nm to 148nm.

That means one could get away with one or two tiny digital torque wrench adapters for a standard ratchet or wrench. Probably not the most accurate - but for someone without torque feel in their hands from decades of turning bolts...

Just look at the screws you have to deal with on a trip.
Can you handle those without one?

No.

A spanner with numbers on the handle that's been heated, frozen, vibrated and has an out of date calibration certificate in your tool box at home is just a spanner with numbers.

Don't kid yourself otherwise.

The only things that need one are staged bolt patterns like cylinder heads.The numbers in manuals are put there by lawyers and warranty people to avoid giving gorillas with ten foot extension bars free stuff. I know, I write the odd manual.

My favourites are the workshops that fetch the wrench back from propping the fire door open, wait for the click, then give it half a turn for luck doh

Use the spanners of the length provided. Those clever Victorians made a half inch Whitworth AF whatever 9 inches long because your average human provides roughly the right torque at that length. Modern tools retain the tradition in traditional styles of hand tool. If things drip give them a tweak.

Andy

If you've been rebuilding Vespas in the middle of the Sahara I'm surprised you don't have 'calibrated fingers'. :rofl:

If Ted or anyone else who wrenches for a living catches this discussion I'm sure they'll have an an opinion on how essential a torque wrench is on a trip but from my perspective I wouldn't (and haven't) take one. Most of the bolts / screws/ other fastenings you're likely to be dealing with at the side of the road will not be 'mission critical' - that is something that if it comes undone will cause serious damage / expense / danger to you. They'll just be regular 6mm / 8mm threads or similar that you deal with all the time in a workshop. If you don't deal with them regularly then is the side or the road - torque wrench in hand or not - the place to start?

If you're delving into the depths of a bike - engine work for example - then yes, a t.r. may be needed for some - mainly internal - fastenings but you're unlikely to be doing that sort of stuff in a car park.

I think I’m the odd one out here, as I take one on every trip! I’ll admit happily that I’m not mechanically minded, so I’m sure it’s just peace of mind for me. I don’t use it anywhere often enough to do this by feel, so the peace of mind for me is great. I don’t disagree with the above comment on spanners with numbers, but I’ve done my bit if anything goes wrong.

Like I said, I don't carry one, and never had a problem for it which I am aware of. Even if I have pulled a scooter into atoms, I considered myself a noob. I have not measured my own hands up against a torque wrench hundreds of times for all bolt sizes to know if my hands are calibrated. I've really only used one where it is noted that torque is especially important. It would be fun to test out the calibration of my hands though. Do I usually always tighten too hard or too soft? By how much am I off the torque wrench?

With noob fingers, working on the same bolts over, and over, or checking for tightness every now and then (by tightening a tiny bit extra ”just to be sure” like some do) - over stretching bolts and threads every time they are worked on... until one day the bolt snaps, the threads are stripped, or there is no stretch left in the fastner to hold it in place over time - slowly unscrewing itself. Or, the noob tightens tings so loose in the first place that everything rattles apart. It might not be mission a critical bolt like a cylinder bolt, and everything may seem well, but it can cause a lot of headache if your bolts go missing, snap or strip out threads.

Many years ago I broke my first torque wrench the first day I used it. It was the longest wrench I had, so now that I had such a beast with so much arm leverage, I might as well try loosening some large rusted wheel bolts on an old tractor - using might of course. I then stored the wrench without resetting it. Next time I came to use it a year later, I read the manual for the first time (don't know why - who would for such a simple tool?). It pretty much told me it was now no longer reliable. I then bought an identical one and tested it against the other. It was off by a significant amount. Back then I would never have thought how much you have to care for these tools. I could very well have been one of those guys who used it to prop up a fire door and obuse it in many ways, and continued using it for years while a
thinking that all is ok.

I'm no expert on these tools, but I still assume that an inexpensive $ 50-100 adapter for ratchets must be better than nothing at all, for a noob . I can't see how it can be very accurate, but I don't see a reason why it wouldn't hit the ball park either. Also, as the torque forces are measured within the adapter itself, where the sockets go, and not on the shaft or handle, I don't see how spanner abuse would matter. A small adapter like that can easily be protected in the luggage.

Now I am tempted to get one and simply leave it in the bike for a year, just to see how well it holds up.

There is a adapter that is basically a extension bar for sockets that is a torque wrench, can get them in any size, 1/4, 1/2 ect. Turns any matching size socket handle into a torque wrench....

Generally the bigger the nut, the more torque is required. And the bigger the nut, the longer the spanner tends to be. So you get a feel for it.

There are some exceptions, which you could note from the bike manual, but I've not used my torque wrench for years.

dont believe all you read in a or bike manual or a newspaper!! !:clap::innocent::innocent::innocent:

Personally no. And as a calibrated and rather sensitive tool, they don't travel well on unpaved roads. They're also rather heavy.

Although, you can get torque wrenches that you can use to loosen fasteners now. So it can double up as the only socket driver you need.

FYI, you should NEVER loosen anything with a torque wrench or go past the 'click' or 'beep' of your torque wrench unless you want to ruin it.

The only time you really need a torque wrench is on engine work. Or where you setting the load on a bearing such as a head-bearing.

In my experience as a mechanic, I find that most people massively over-tighten things if they don't use a torque wrench or if they lack experience. The worst being sump nuts and oil filters.

I came across a guy in Egypt who stripped his oil-sump thread whilst doing an oil change in a carpark in Egypt. His trip was pretty much over.

However, this was the FIRST time he'd ever tried to change his own oil. Even after owning the bike for years and having years to prep and learn how to do it before he left home.

Practice any job you're likely going to need to do on the road before you leave.

Yes, oil plug - large diameter bolt in thin soft aluminium. Similarity, spark plugs. Both can end your trip. Carrying helicoil inserts is a good idea. These are two excellent examples where a torque wrench is a good idea for a noob.

I'm not so sure that those that think their hands are calibrated to feel the right torque are nearly as accurate as they think. Most professional mechanics I know use torque wrenches on fasteners where consequences of getting it wrong is big.

You can easily make a torque wrench with a luggage weight and a spanner, but probably not something useful over 40NM.

I am one of those that hardly ever use a torque wrench, and we're I do, probably tighten too hard. I am however fairly good at using blue locktite. If I used a torque wrench more often, maybe my hands could become a bit more calibrated as well.

I once did a trial at a very big heavy vehicle manufacturer in the UK. They'd lost control of the slipper wrenches and air tools they had kicking about the place to the point stuff started falling off. As we'd supplied the components that fell off they blamed us.

The workers on the line were closer to the ideal torques using hand tools than the collection of uncalibrated tools and variable process (gun to 9 gazillion Nm, then prove its over 200Nm when the slipper wrench clicks :nono:) . They also tended to go the right way, stretching a mounting bolt, having to tweak up a leaky air fitting, where as the wrenches were random of just wrong.

They invested a couple of million in blue toothed stuff after that.

Anything in the joint like Loctite or copper slip changes the torque setting, so the numbers in the manual are then no longer what the tool should be set to. By feel you tend to account for it.

25+ years in Automotive engineering and there are maybe half a dozen joints designed for service disassembly I can think of that needed a torque tool. The only one on a bike outside weird stuff is going to be the cylinder head. Drain plugs are tightened with one finger then tweaked until the drips stop. The idea that tighter is better is a known problem, its why BMW have part numbers for top hat inserts in their parts catalogue (also covers them when the manuals are wrong).

Andy

???
 

=
so I use it when tightening the chain
=


Why and how ?


Correct tension of a chain is when you can move it 25-35 mm up and down.
Torque wrench ??

Torque wrench
 

The question was if you carry one.

Ye, I have more than one in the garage.
Mainly for cylinder heads.To get it even and tight.

But I do not often lift the cylinder head when I am out driving....

Any thoughts about the chain tension, (another source of wear as over anxious owners endlessly fiddle to achieve some nirvana of laser plumb bob set 25.174mm), are certainly misplaced.

The torque on the axle nut is usually only to make sure its seated, not hung up on the nyloc and yet discourage garage gorillas from using the windy gun.

Andy

Chain tension is measured on 99% of motorcycles on the side stand. And the amount of free-play does change dramatically depending on the bike. The free-play is taken up when you sit on the bike. It's not meant to be sloppy when the bike is weighted nor is it meant to be drum-tight. Your chain gets slacker and looser depending on how much you compress your suspension.

And you should find the tight spot when doing this on a worn chain as they do wear unevenly.

Unless you're riding an old classic, every spindle has a locking nut or locking device on their spindles. It's actually an MOT fail if they don't.

It's pretty much impossible to over-tighten your spindle unless you're a brute using a breaker-bar.


Rattle guns don't belong near any bike when re-fitting anything.

This does rather seem to be an odd question.
Personally, I have never heard of anyone travelling with a torque wrench and sockets, and would never do so myself.
I have some very fine quality torque wrenches in my workshop, which, when at home, I use for axle nuts, axle pinch bolts, caliper mounts, etc.
When I'm travelling, I make do with simple tools that are easily transportable.
I also have a centre lathe, a pillar drill, an air compressor and a range of air tools, all of which I am happy to travel without.
:cool4:

There are no such things as odd questions on the HUBB.

Only a plethora of odd answers bier

One of the things that inspired the question in the first place was looking at pictures of adventure riders’s toolkits and seeing torque wrenches, and then thinking that just maybe they are the ones that got it right.

I think the greatest cons against bringing one are:

• size
• weight
• cost

If I could find something small, lightweight and inexpensive with an inaccuracy of less than 10% (less than 5% is pro territory) - why would I not bring one?

As for the arguments that it won't hold up on a bumpy and vibrating ride - I would take my chances, like I do with fine electronics and camera optics, whiskey and my favorite crackers.

The difference being. You can tell when you're Camera is broken, your whisky is spilled and your crackers are now crumbs.

You will only find out you've damaged your torque wrench when something goes "Ping"

However, you're probably right. An anologue Torque wrench will probably be fine. It's all these new fancy digital ones which are rather fragile.

I am no mechanic ,but do all my basic servicing myself , and never used a torque wrench in my life .
If a nut is hard to undue you need to tighten it hard
If a nut comes undone easy , dont tighten too much ! easy !!

That might be true, but if you otherwise relied on your hands being calibrated, wouldn't your hands let you know if things were seriously wrong with your torque wrench? And, every now and then you could check it's calibration with some simple math and another torque wrench or a luggage weight - even a measured container of water tied to the end of the handle for measured force.

I never knew of these digital torque adapters until recently. Here are a few examples: https://torquewrenchcenter.com/best-...orque-adapter/

I'm undecided. It is just a thought. Like others, I have done well without. I am yet to snap a bolt or strip threads on any bike. The only fasteners lost have not been put there by me. I don't consider myself good, just lucky. No chance in hell that I with any level of certainty can say I am within a few percent of recommended torque, not even close

I have worked in a fitting shop with skilled people whose idea of the correct torque for any given size fastener varied between little more than finger tight to almost thread stripping tight, a table of standard torque settings and a couple of company torque wrenches helped sort that out, they have their place.

I think you're going to have to come to your own conclusion as to whether it's sensible to take a torque wrench with you. The jury of your peers seem to be of the (majority) opinion that it's not necessary but what do they know. If it puts your mind at ease take it and leave one of the bottles of whisky behind to save the weight, although given a torque wrench is of little use without a suitable selection of sockets, it might need to be two bottles.

If you do take it I don't doubt you'll find a use for it (even if it's to ward off wild animals) as hammers tend to find their own nails. Maybe I've been lucky in not taking one but there's been many other tools I've wished I had with me more than a torque wrench. I suppose it might make a difference in the margins but where do you call a halt to doing / taking stuff 'just in case'. We refilled our car's cooling system with holy water when we visited Lourdes some years ago on the basis it might help. It doesn't seem to have - it's just as unreliable as ever. :rofl:

Unless you're planning to cross Antarctica by bike I can't believe you won't be within easy reach of someone with any tool you're likely to need. People break down all over the planet. On a trip we did many (many) years ago we lacked the means to undo the fork top nut - we borrowed this from a shipyard :


https://i.postimg.cc/KzdTQS1g/Corfu5.jpg

I carry the torque wrench inside the kitchen sink.







































... at home :mchappy:

If you dont trust your mechanics hands and you fear stripping bolts as you tighten them or maybe you fear they are too loose after you are done.

Well there is a good way to learn to developp your mechanics hand without any fear of messing up your prized motorcycle.

What you do is you bring your tools and a torque wrench also to a "u-pull it" type junkyard of your choice. Then you practice on any car you like.

I encourage you to overtighten and strip bolts on purpose so you will see what it feels like.

Also bring the torque spec sheets from a commonly seen car you know will be there and test your hands using the toque wrench only to verify if you went too far or not enough.

My last tip is this one. Any small bolt head that is 8mm or 10mm, do not tighten them using the end of the handle of a ratchet. Grab the ratchet at or near the head(the clickety part). You greately reduce the risk of stripping out a small fastener this way.

Never forget that the longer a wrench or a ratchet is, the same effort you apply on this longer wrench translates to more torque. Torque is no the same thing as "effort".

For example in my car I carry a very long(30 inch) breaker bar for lug nuts. When I tighten the nuts, I grab the bar not at the end, I grab it at the halfway point so I can "feel" the torque better and not overtighten the lug nuts.

I'll mention one thing that I don't do. I don't tighten up small bolts - say 6mm (probably the commonest size on most bikes) thread - with big ratchets (1/2" drive size). That's a sure fire way of stripping them. I have sets of the three common drive size sockets - 1/4", 3/8" and 1/2" and I use them selectively. So smaller bolt = smaller drive size socket. I also have three torque wrenches - one for each size - because in my experience they're more accurate in the middle part of their range (maybe not Ted's hyper expensive professional ones, but I can only justify consumer grade ones). So tightening a 5mm thread bolt with a 1/2" drive torque wrench right at the bottom of its range is a no-no.

So if you're going to take one on a trip which size wrench is it going to be? 3/8" as the most widely useful? Are you going to do up your spindle nuts with that? From memory mine only goes up to around 70nm. Can you even get 28mm (or whatever size the spindle nut is) 3/8" drive sockets or is it going to have to be cobbled together with 1/2" drive socket and a converter?

It's not really necessary to do everything with ratcheting socket wrenches on the road. In my shop at home I've got all sorts of wrenches--different drive sizes, different lengths of handle, different depths for sockets, flexible heads of various sorts, metric and imperial of everything, whole racks of extensions...

But on the road, simple stamped-out combination spanners work fine for most stuff, including those big axle bolts. Throw in a select few 1/4 sockets, a (small) handful of forged combination wrenches, and a pair of vice grips and you've got more than you'll likely need for years on end.

I'm not splitting cases, changing valve shims, or (in the case of my KLRs) replacing balancer mechanisms on the road. When I've had to change front sprockets enroute--very rarely, in my experience--I've had to find someone with a breaker bar or an impact wrench. That's a pretty good tradeoff in my book.

I've never wanted a torque wrench on the road. Yes, I cringe every time I tighten the drain bolt after changing my oil, but I don't torque that at home either--just a hair past "it's stopped dripping" has served me well.

Having been a dealer and mechanic, I've seen far too many stripped drains and generally stripped bolts. BMW airheads are known for stripping the cylinder bolts out of the crankcase - a massively difficult repair to do right for reasons I won't go into here, it's well documented. Stripped drains can be really difficult to repair too, even requiring replacing crankcases occasionally.

There IS a fix - one, a torque wrench.

OR two, safety wire everything. :) All my critical bolts, especially drains, on all my bikes, are drilled for safety wire. Overkill? You won't think so when that - just a smidge more - suddenly becomes really easy. I always replace the crush washer, tighten till nicely crushed, then wire it. And no worrying.
UNDER torquing could result in an experience a friend had when his drain fell out of his BMW on a dirt road. Luckily I was following and spotted the black strip quickly, caught up and stopped him. Fork oil and a little transmission oil got him to a service station. It could have been ugly.

BTW - for the BMW airhead cylinder head torques - a couple pounds UNDER specified torque is relatively safe.
And finally, remember torque specs are generally for DRY threads, not well lubed ones. It's really easy to over-torque lubed threads, especially on smaller bolts. DAMHIK.

I can think of a few bolts that likely will come off during a long trip, where torque is important, and where the probability of me getting it wrong is not entirely improbable (with serious ramifications):

Oil drain, calipers, spark plugs...

I think I will start carrying at least one or two torque adapters (in place of a large, heavy and expensive torque wrench). They are not too big/heavy, and not too expensive, and they are supposedly highly accurate (unless you buy cheap crap). They are not supposed to be used in place of a torque wrench though - but in combination with "feel" it should be far better than not having a torque wrench at all.

Grant's idea of wiring the drain plug seems like a very good idea. I have also seen someone loose their drain plug once - it was game over.

On important bolts, or bolts that have a tendency to unscrew themselves, I will usually use a permanent marker on the bolt head to mark its position. That way I can on my routine checks easily see if it has turned, without bringing out my tools. If I have to set a new mark (after removing and refatsening), the old mark comes off easily with spirits.

Drilling a small hole in the head of the bolt seems easy enough. Not sure how and where to attach the wire to the crank case though - so that there is little to no play for the bolt to unscrew itself. Any suggestions? Weld or glue something to the crank case to fasten the wire to?

The most commonly stripped threads I have found are the M6 bolts holding the oil filter cover on many bikes. 10 - 13 Nm (depending on Honda, Yamaha or other engineer's specs) It's not much. A 1/4 drive torque wrench in that range is not that big, and if you're not too confident of the calibration of your wrist, might save some woes. For larger stuff, the margin for error is greater and I think a large tw less necessary. The suggestion of different length levers for different torques is a good one.

There's always something to use I've found. I've drilled fins in the sump or nearby, drilled another unrelated bolt just to use as an anchor, wired around a frame rail, whatever - there's always something.

Tips: .032" diameter stainless wire is cheap and readily available and is the standard wire for safety wiring by airplane and race mechanics. It's also useful if something breaks and you need to attach x to y, as it's very strong. I carry a 10 ft length wound tight around a couple of fingers, (I do remember to remove my fingers ;)) and that's plenty for a long time. Made it RTW with about double that, and my R80G/S had 5 plugs and an oil filter three-bolt-cover to wire!

https://www.horizonsunlimited.com/im...fety-wired.jpg

In the above image you can see the wire from one of the body assembly screws, and the hole for the wire for the oil cooler hose bolt on my R80G/S.

https://www.horizonsunlimited.com/im...fety-wired.jpg
Above is the ground cable / transmission vent safety wiring - just goes around the cable

https://www.horizonsunlimited.com/im...fety-wired.jpg
above - Motor mount bolt wiring around the frame.

https://www.horizonsunlimited.com/im...fety-wired.jpg
Above - Gear shift lever- on left - safety wiring an allen screw, and on right, the transmission fill plug.
It was leaking badly from the pushrod tubes when this was taken!

You can drill all the way straight though - dead easy - or as in the fill plug above I went through from the top then from the outside, or through a corner, all depends on what you're trying to do. Also on the fill plug you can see I drilled a hole in a fin to anchor to.

Hopefully that will give you some ideas.

An inexpensive safety wiring jig below makes drilling the holes a lot easier, though I've always done mine by hand - and wished I had one of these!
https://www.horizonsunlimited.com/im...-jig-cheap.jpg
And if you want to go whole hog, safety wire pliers (this is mine, over 50 years old and working great:)
https://www.horizonsunlimited.com/im...ire-pliers.jpg

How to safety wire

Finally, we also want to use Loctite where appropriate, and nylock nuts are great, I use them everywhere possible, and Nord-Lock washers are a newer technology, and excellent, well worth checking out.

Here's some links for tools - using my affiliate link, I'll make a few pennies: :) Thanks!

Safety wire pliers
Amazon.com - Amazon.ca - Amazon.co.uk - Amazon.de

Drilling jig
Good one:
Amazon.com - Amazon.ca - Amazon.co.uk - Amazon.de
Inexpensive one:
Amazon.com - Amazon.ca - couldn't find on Amazon.co.uk or Amazon.de - let me know if you do and I'll add it here.

Safety wire:
Amazon.com - Amazon.ca - Amazon.co.uk - couldn't find on Amazon.de - let me know if you do and I'll add it here.

Nord-lock:
Amazon.com - Amazon.ca - Amazon.co.uk - Amazon.de

I'm going to ruin everyone's torque wrench party now.

Did you know that many modern bikes use single use stretch bolts.

Especially Rotax engined BMW's, KTMS etc. And they're used a lot of performance and race bikes because they're REALLY lightweight.

You tighten to THEIR specified Torque (Usually about 4nm for an M6 which is half of what it is on a standard steel bolt), and then you turn it another 90 degrees going around the case or component and then you tighten another 90 degrees.

And if they've been removed and not replaced by a previous mechanic then you are in a lost world where no torque wrench will save you.

I've been re-using them for years now. I give my customers the choice but as it's way too expensive to keep replacing them, I just do it by feel. But I wince with every turn. I've only snapped one or two in the last ten years so I think I've got it pinned.

:funmeterno:

Then there is Torque adjustment for lubricant and thread locking. And all torque is measured for CLEAN, new bolt. Corroded bolts need a lot less torque too.

And if you've changed any bolts to stainless or to hi-ten, then this changes the torque also.

Maybe Grants wire locking isn't as "OTT" as I was first tempted to call it :)

If you bring a Torque wrench then you're going to need all the documentation and paranoia that goes with using one.

:smartass:

Lockwire is a very useful thing to take. I've held my exhaust system together with it in the past and it's currently holding the two halves of the suspension height sensor together on my Land Rover while I wait for a new one to arrive.

What's the purpose of the one shot bolts? Is it just to stop people 'fiddling', a kind of 'no user serviceable parts inside' warning, or is there some sound engineering reason why they're a more sensible choice than regular bolts.

Grant - this was very useful and inspiring! I have not added safety wire on any of my bikes - but will from now on!
-------
Touring Ted - I am aware of the issues regarding; stretch in bolts, rust, grease, etc. As far as I know, the non-reusable bolts you refer to (that at the same time are critical), are not only limited in numbers on the bike, but most also come off very seldom. On a single cylinder thumper built for touring - the cylinder head once every 50.000,- kms??? And this I can plan for, and could probably afford new bolts also.

Still, even when reusing bolts for the cylinder head where calculating the correct torque in particular instances can be virtually impossible - where there are more than one bolt in a pattern (i.e. pretty much any component with a gasket... cylinder heads, crank case, etc) it is probably more important aiming for the same torque on all identical bolts on a part rather than aiming for the correct torque. You might not get the proper torque with the torque wrench in these cases, but you will get all the identical bolts fastened to the same torque - ensuring a flush and tight fit with even force across the component.

So again, the combination of hand feel, and the torque wrench for reference, is still a good idea to me - regardless of the condition of the used bolt.

As for greased bolts where you are supposed to have dry ones, subtracting +/- 20% to the torque setting should compensate for much of the unknown? As for rusted bolts, you would go the opposite way - tightening harder. When I do major work on my bike I usually clean my bolts with brake cleaner, brushes and rags anyways - which reduces the issue. If the bolts are rusted or badly worn, I change them - usually to rust free, where I can use a nylon nut. Popular mechanics has a good article on these topics for noobs: https://www.popularmechanics.com/car...ount-of-force/

I still believe that a torque adapter on the road, regardless if we are talking old or new bolts, or rust free for that matter - that it is the safer way to go... at least for someone like me who doesn't turn a wrench in my profession. I only occasionally turn a wrench - when my own vehicles require it - which doesn't happen every week. The torque wrench is also instrumental to calibrate my own hands a bit better.

As for having the torque references on hand - it is very quickly looked up - at least in the T7 manual. Further, one could also mark them directly on the bike, next to the fastener if one really could be bothered to do such prep work.


--------
@Backofbeyond. All bolts stretch to some extent, and for every use they loose some of this stretchiness. Think of it like an elastic that helps keep the fasteners and parts securely in its place. In part it has a similar effect as a lock washer or a spring put between the part and the end of the bolt head or nut.

Where the lock washer or spring provides elastic or spring forces only across a short length of the fastener, an elastic bolt helps distribute these forces evenly across the entire length of the fastener, as well as across the length of the threads - keeping it all tight and secure.

Further, elastic bolts have more "give". By being less brittle they don't snap or fail from fatigue as easily either. For shorter fasteners this stretch has less of an effect simply because there is less stretch - thereby it comes loose more easily. On a long bolt the bolt in itself acts almost like a lock washer or spring. This is one reason why using lock washers, loctite and/or nylon nuts becomes more important on short fasteners than on long ones - especially if the fastener is hard (i.e. rust free).

Cylinder head bolts for example are very long and skinny - they go all the way through the length of the cylinder head and way down into the crank case. They are not short and fat - for the reasons mentioned above. The fasteners holding your luggage rack on the other hand - here you want locktite, lock washers and/or nylon bolts.

On cylinder heads - uneven or refastening old bolts with too little torque can lead to big problems that safety wire can't prevent. Tighten too hard is not good either. And, if you tighten to the point that they snap, you can be in a world of agony.

On bolts such as on your oil drain plug, being a little soft and sweet on the torqueing, at the expense of risking it coming undone down the road - is far better than tightening to the point were snapped bolts or stripped threads is probable ("just to make sure" that it doesn't come undone)... that is of course only true if you use a safety wire like Grant does. If you don't use such a wire, then tightening to the point where you are confident it won't come undone (with the risk os snapping or stripping), is the better choice on this particular bolt (because if the oil in your crank gase is gone, it is game over). Therefore - safety wire is a really good idea on the oil drain plug, and several others!

A couple of examples of why to safety wire or use a torque wrench at least:

A long discussion of this one on the HUBB here. Lots of fixes suggested!


and a plaintive - "can I just weld this up?" on a DRZ400:

Totally agree, me too

motor bikes are full of nuts + bolts :ban:

I deal with stripped threads almost daily as I work on a lot of older bikes.

What I have found is that those replacement stainless steel sump bolts that people who are obsessed with blinging their bike with, are often a curse.

They are very unforgiving with aluminium sumps. A sump plug should be mild steel. Stainless doesn't really belong in any aluminum thread unless it's very low torque. It's much harder, sharper and because they usually come from Chinese sweat shops, the manufacturing processes aren't great either.

If I think back, probably 90% of stripped sumps I've had to repair have been fitted with Stainless steel sump bolts.

Although this could also be down to the fact that those bikes which have stainless plugs have been "over-tampered" with by owners with more enthusiasm than skill.

You might remember (or maybe still have to fix a few) the oil filter bolts on the old single cam Hondas. They were fitted with a 14mm head intentionally to stop you tightening them too much - they only had to hold the oil filter cover in place - but because they were big bolts they were habitually overtightened to the point where the bolt head rounded off, and next time you couldn't remove it.

The fix? - an aftermarket bolt with a 17mm head. That could take a really big spanner which then cracked either the cover or the crankcase.

Chinese spec "stainless" drain bolt, missing or re-used ten times aluminium washer, tightened with a ten foot bar to make sure it doesn't fall out then torqued with wrench last calibrated in 1984 = one careful owner, full service history :rofl:

Andy

But how many careless owners?