Re: Dirty torquer

Yesterday, I rotated and torqued the tires for the first time ever. ...And checked the brakes. Having the Camry up on 4 jack stands was neat to see. I did it all in a municipal public parking garage that had a very flat, smooth, concrete surface. The ground vibrations you feel inside some parking garages when a car drives by was minimal or nonexistent in this garage.

The car was rock-steady on those 4 stands. I tested the setup by pushing and rocking the car around a little bit before I went underneath. The car was very firm and steady.

The Sears Craftsman torque wrench (model 44595) worked wonderfully. I first torqued all lug nuts to 40 foot-pounds, then 60, and finally the specified torque of 76. Since the car appeared to be so steady on this flat parking garage surface, I tightened the rear wheels to their final torque of 76 while the car was still on stands. It was impossible to torque the front wheels while on stands because the front wheels freely moved forwards and backwards, I guess because the Camry is front-wheel drive. But the rear wheels didn't move, so torquing them was easy while on stands.

Instead of following the Camry manual's instruction of tightening the lug nuts finger-tight while the car is on stands, I followed _Auto Upkeep's_ instruction and snugged the front wheels just a little bit extra with a lug wrench. I also didn't lower the car commpletely before applying final torque with the torque wrench, like the Camry manual suggests. I decided to follow _Auto Upkeep's_ direction and lowered the car until the wheels were just barely touching the ground, then tightened the front wheels to final torque with the torque wrench. Again, I torqued each wheel's nuts gradually: first all 40, then 60, and finally 76. The click on the torquer sure is a wonderful feature.

To backtrack a bit to an earlier step, I felt that some of the lug nuts were on extra tight. It took some muscle to loosen some of 'em with the 20-inch-long, 4-way lug wrench. So I decided to check the torque on the last wheel before loosening its lug nuts. I first set the Craftsman at 76 and it clicked without allowing any easy tightening. So I next tried 84 foot-pounds, and it clicked. So I tried 92 and it clicked! Finally I set the wrench to 120 foot-pounds, and it still clicked without my tightening the lug nut at all! The manual's spec. is 76 foot-pounds of torque on the '06 Camry's lug nuts. So a couple nuts on the last wheel that I experimented with were on at least to 120 foot-pounds, and of course, possibly even tighter, since I stopped checking at 120.

I guess that's another reason to do your own work, if you can. The last person to tighten the car's nuts was the Toyota dealership's technician 5,000 miles ago. And you'll recall that he didn't use a proper torque wrench to do the tightening; he used some kind of automatic/electrical, small silver ratchet that didn't look like an impact wrench since it wasn't shaped like a drill, but instead shaped like a thin ratchet. It looked like it may have been attached to a possible extension bar (possibly a torque-limiting stick). Anyway, I guess it's a case of doing a job yourself if you want it done right. /Or is he not to blame?/ Is it possible that the lug nuts somehow tightened themselves from the specification of 76 to 120-plus foot-pounds during the last 5,000 miles of driving?

Some of those lug nuts let out a really loud screetch when I untightened them.

I guess I'll see after the next 5,000 miles if lug nuts can tighten themselves, because I carefully torqued each one yesterday to 76.

Reply to
Built_Well
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Doesn't necessarily mean they were incorrectly tightened (though 120 ft-lb is a little over the edge). There are a number of reasons (corrosion, metals welding themselves together, rough edges, etc.) that bolts that were correctly torqued will take a greater force to remove after they have been in place for a while. Ask anyone who has ever tried to remove a Honda crankshaft bolt. They go on at 180 lb-ft. They come off at about 400.

Did you check the mating surfaces and threads for corrosion & damage before you put it back together? If not, I suspect you will find that they will be tighter than 76 when you try to get them off, & the longer you wait the tighter they'll be.

Reply to
E Meyer

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Yes, I carefully examined the mating surfaces of both the hubs and the wheels. Very, very little rust on the hubs and close to none on the wheels. The white-looking hubs did show some black scuff marks where the inner wheels mated with them, but that's about it. The black-colored inner wheel mating surfaces were scuffed a bit, too, but the scuffs took on a shinier, bare metal appearance. Just about no brown rust where the wheels and hubs mate. It all looked pretty good to me.

I would just recommend folks request their Toyota dealer's techs to use a proper torque wrench, as Retired VIP once wrote many months ago--I think it was he.

The techs at Sears, Walmart, and Big O tires all use torque wrenches. By the way, when I visited Big O Tires a couple days ago to look at how they handled their torquers, I was surprised by how dirty they keep their work areas. Yow, woah, it's like a pig sty in there. By contrast, the automotive work area at Walmart was really clean--maybe because they have a woman working back there who knows the value of cleanliness, or maybe it's just a Walmart policy--dunno.

Reply to
Built_Well

Built_Well wrote in news:82674cf8-73d2- snipped-for-privacy@w7g2000hsa.googlegroups.com:

Fasteners do NOT "tighten themselves". If they should move at all, they will loosen.

If fasteners appear to tighten after installation, it's primarily due to a well-known phenomenon known as "embedment". Embedment occurs when the surface textures of a fastener's threads and its receiving threads come into closer mesh through vibration and heat cycling. Embedment can lead to the need for two to three times tightening torque when loosening.

If your lug nuts emitted a "screech" when you loosened them, then there was rust somewhere on the mating surfaces. Either the nuts have not been disturbed for a very long time, or they were installed when wet.

Reply to
Tegger

Some of the lug nuts were easier to loosen than others. I'd say about a third of the 20 threaded studs and nuts let out a screech upon loosening. So maybe a third may have been subjected to a little rust.

I can't say if the rust was a result of the studs and nuts not being disturbed for a long time, because the wheels were rotated only about 8 months ago, by the Toyota dealer tech. It took me about 8 months to add 5,000 miles.

Just wanted to add to my previous post that the brake pads of the disc brakes looked good. They measured 3/8 of an inch in thickness. If the metal frame in included, 4/8 inch. And no cracking in the rubbery brake lines was seen.

Sears has a newer model of the Microtork 44595. The 4459*7* has a range from 25 foot-pounds to 250 foot-pounds compared to 20 - 150 for the 44595. The *7* model runs $40 more: $120 but it's currently on sale for $100.

Reply to
Built_Well

The '06 Camry's rear drum brakes were exceptionally clean of rust. I mean I don't remember seeing even a hint of rust on those drums, and I've seen lots of drum brakes on cars that were loaded with rust. The dark grey color of the rear drums and hubs almost didn't even look metallic, they were so clean.

There was some rust on the front disc brakes and hubs, but it was very minimal. If I were to apply anti-seize next time on the face of the front hubs, will that arrest the small amount of rust that is already there? The front hubs were mostly white in color, except for a couple small spots where the rust is found.

The twenty studs looked to be in good shape, except for one that had some shavings at its free end. Once untightened, the twenty nuts all screwed off easily by hand except for one that gave me a little bit of trouble as it came close to the free end of the stud. I think I had to use the lug wrench to undo that one near the end.

The CV boots were in great shape, and the rotors showed absolutely no grooves. I remember I once had to replace the CV boots on the '95 Tercel, probably around the year 2002 or so. One shop in town was only charging $80 for parts and labor.

Happy Father's Day to all the dads out there!

Reply to
Built_Well

That would make me very apprehensive even so. My own preference is never to get under any car which is not supported by everything but the kitchen sink. What about leaving 2 wheels on at a time and using 3 or even 4 jack stands at the other end for a job like this ?

Cheers

Geoff

Reply to
whitefamily1

in case nobody's suggested it, it's good practice to retorque after

50-100 miles or so just in case something was stuck that unstuck under the load of driving.
Reply to
z

You should be able to put the car on 4 stands and rock the living shit out of it. Better it falls off BEFORE you get under it.

And if you think that's excessive, you've not seen how much force you can exert on a car trying to remove rusted fasteners.

I've napped under my race car at 3am. Held up with 4 stands and no tires. But, you'll never catch me under a car held up with a bumper jack.

Ray

Reply to
ray

Got some even bigger jack stands tonight: 7 tons! 7 tons for a 1.5- ton car. $40 at AutoZone, and better quality than the 6-ton Harbor Freight models. Plus their range is 14.5 inches to 25 inches. 14.5 inches is perfect height. I was worried that a 7-ton monster would go no lower than 19 inches or so, but not these.

AutoZone now has an AutoZone rewards program (AutoZoneRewards.com). Each store's program is different, but my store will give you $20 in store-spending credit if you spend about $120 dollars over 6 months.

O'Reilly Auto now sells high temperature anti-seize with copper in it. Good for up to 2,000*F. The regular aluminum-containing anti- seize at Napa said 1,600*F. I'll use the aluminum variety on the hubs next time I rotate, since it doesn't get even remotely close to either of those temps at the hub-wheel interface.

Reply to
Built_Well

Forgot to add that I saw some Lubro Moly at a local Napa today. Also saw it there about 6 months ago. It's a great German-made oil that contains molybdenum. Even at $37 a gallon or $10+ for a quart-sized container, it flew off the shelves 6 months ago. Very popular oil.

Wow, Tiger Woods is unbelievable. He won another U.S. Open today. He's unstoppable, like Bill Clinton in '92 or Barack Obama today.

Reply to
Built_Well

Try untorquing the rear axle nuts on an old VW...

Reply to
Nza

In my VW days, I had a 1/2" breaker bar with the big socket welded to it. Broke a couple before I did that. Still took a pipe extension and me jumping up and down on it! jor

Reply to
jor

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