Are you trolling? If you don't know the difference between clockwise and counterclockwise, take your car to jiffy lube. You can lie under the car with your legs sticking out in any direction you want, clockwise is still the same direction. Seriously. Try it.
Or a life-saver! Some types of gas lines have left-handed threads, so you can connect them wrong or take them off by mistake.
Jeff
Those are great for older vehicles and for things like motorcycles that have a wet clutch. The newer oils don't work well in those applications as the additive package cause problems. They won't cause problems in newer vehicles though.
No, I am not trolling.
Several responses that did answer the question without any sort of smart remark whatsoever referred to the possibility of left handed threads, that is why I was asking. I don't want to turn the bolt what seems to be logically counter-clockwise (i.e., towards the left when facing front or towards the right when facing rear) and end up snapping off the bolt due to over torquing it.
Hls, I think your answer is important enough that I'm going to re-post it here under the main thread to make sure I see it in case I feel the need to re-read this thread 6 months from now when I first change the oil.
I went back to your post and didnt find anything that I could correlate with a question about left handed threads.
My response to you was not intended to be flippant. You did not seem to know how to perceive "clockwise".
A post told you that left handed threads are rare in cars. They are. Some Chrysler products used left handed threads on lug nuts on one side of the car. ( It wasnt necessary, but they did it anyway). I believe some fan clutches may also entail left handed threads.
When removing bolts, you might not have any way to know if a left hander is hiding there. So proceed cautiously. Lots of right hand threaded bolts have been stripped and broken off by people who get too rambunctious with a wrench.
Yup. Seen the warnings for a while. Even though I'm just a diy-er, I really didn't think about this stuff until I had kids. Now, I do because I'd like to live long enough to see my kids grow up.
(But I'm still going racing.)
Ray
What, no big metal pan to put under the vehicle to catch all the oil spills? No magnet or long pliers to fetch the oil drain screw in case it drops into the pan?
The first thing I do is I loosen the filter until there's a gap between it and the engine so heat can escape.
The oil film on the gasket helps it seat better. It must be important because when o-rings for air conditioner hose assemblies aren't lubed, they leak like crazy.
They cut way back on their hand tools after they replaced their own Popular Mechanics brand with Stanley, which is too bad because I think that Stanleys have to be returned to the manufacturer for warranty replacement, and Popular Mechanics was about the only brand of torque wrench with a lifetime warranty.
Sears is sometimes the cheapest for individual sockets, sometimes cheaper than even Harbor Freight.
If you have a GM belt tensioner with a flat idler pulley it has a left hand threaded bolt securing the pulley to the tensioner. Just replaced another one on a vehicle that the owner tried to "repair" by replacing the idler. OOPS.
The problem with this and many other warnings of this type are these words "continuous contact" with "whatever product" has caused skin cancer in laboratory animal tests.
That basically means they shave the rat. Put a product soaked cotton ball on the spot and tape it there. Then they replace it with a new one every few hours or just shoot some more of the product onto the cotton. Not a realistic test of what really happens. I doubt there is anyone out there taking baths in used oil. or soaking their clothes in it and wearing them while dripping oil.
How about this warning. Continuous inhalation of H2O has been shown to cause death in humans in actual life.
"Steve W." wrote in news:fem4d6$jof$ snipped-for-privacy@aioe.org:
The method used is called "maximum tolerated dose". Basically they up the dosage to a point just short of killing the animal, then they see if pathologies develop.
This is how they test most substances, including everything the State of California "knows" causes cancer (which seems to be just about everything on Earth, judging by those ubiquitous Prop 65 placards...)
The method is highly unrealistic for everyday life.
Yeah, maybe that dihydrogen oxide should be a controlled substance!
I suspect that AutoZone personnel are only half a notch above Wal-Mart when it comes to automotive expertise. Also, it is kind of difficult to hide the fact that you are changing the oil in the parking lot if you call them out for advice ;-)
There are lots of automotive impact guns that put out over 500 foot-pounds.
Torque Stix usually work well, it's the user that do not always work well. If the front rotors were warped witth Torque Stix on the impact gun, the user either didn't read, couldn't comprehend, or ignored the directions that came with them. You have to release the trigger when the lug nut stops rotating because if you keep hammering, they will still allow the lug nuts to become over-tightened.
There was a rumor that skateboarding caused cancer, but the scientists couldn't prove or disprove the rumor because the rats wouldn't stay on the skateboard long enough.
That could well be the problem, Ray. Tools, in the hands of those who dont know how to use them, or who refuse to use them as they were designed to be used, can be weapons.
We have a local tire company which still puts on wheels with impact wrenches with no Torque Stix. They dont even have a torque wrench in the house. When I am forced to use them, I take my own torque wrench and insist that they use it.
Uuuhhh...if it takes that many lines to describe how to do something as simple as an oil and filter change I shudder to think how many CD's are needed to describe a brake job! The problem with writing overly detailed instructions to fit all cars is that many readers will focus intently on trying to complete each step in sequence and fail to think about whether a given step makes sense for their car.
Another thing that disappointed me about my Toyota tech's service was the way he tightened the wheel's lug nuts.
Instead of following the manual's procedure of gradually tightening the set of 5 nuts on a wheel, he completely tightened one, then went onto the next. I would have appreciated it if he would have simply tightened each nut half-way before returning to it. That's not too much extra work.
Well, at least he did follow a star pattern. But, as I said the other day, the worst part was his not using a torque wrench to tighten the nuts, so he couldn't have precisely applied 76 foot-pounds of torque per lug nut, as the manual calls for.
That's not exactly premiere Toyota service.
I can only hope no rotors or drums are being warped. (The '06 Camry LE uses drum brakes in the rear and disks in front; the '07 uses disk brakes all around).
The tech isn't new. He told me he's been working on Toyotas for years. And he must be 40- or 50- something. So it's not like I got a newcomer to work on my car.
========
That's another good reason for the techs to use torque wrenches instead of impact guns with torque sticks.
The torque wrench I saw at O'Reilly Auto Parts clicks when the proper torque has been reached. You just set it to 76 foot-pounds, and the wrench clicks when 76 is reached. Wonderful. No guessing.
That means they are setting you up for the latest scam. They expect you to come back complaining of pulsing brakes and their diagnoses will be warped rotors so you now need a full brake job...
I went to a new shop with a fresh young mechanic owing it yesterday with a friend to pick up his car after a brake job and the mechanic was finishing off the wheel lug nuts 'with' a torque wrench as we drove up.
I was impressed.
Mike
86/00 CJ7 Laredo, 33x9.5 BFG Muds, 'glass nose to tail in '00 88 Cherokee 235 BFG AT's - G> Another thing that disappointed me about my Toyota tech'sMotorsForum website is not affiliated with any of the manufacturers or service providers discussed here. All logos and trade names are the property of their respective owners.