Halfords Torque Wrench

[A G Wood]

In the slightly more modern era, same deal with Hillman Imps, showed no Mercy to the hamfisted or impatient mechanic.

[Colin Wilks]

Modern cars seem to go from crazy tight, typically for single use stretch bolts, to crazy loose. Working on my son's diesel Citroen a while ago the torque figure for the injector bolts was I think just 4 Newton metres. Needless to say they were done up with as much gentle feel as I could muster with a 1/4" drive socket. How many there are out there with stripped threads in the aluminium head that are just gummed up with thread lock is anyone's guess. Cheaper for the manufacturer to stick a bolt in than specify a stud with a nut of course.

Good tip above from AG Wood about giving a rarely used wrench a couple of dry runs in the vice before using it. Makes a lot of sense and hadn't occurred to this amateur fettler. Thanks!

[Chris KC]

Understood Bob and yes I agree, it would be very unwise to gaily apply modern torque settings to 90-year-old joints without at least a pause for thought.

[A G Wood]

Yes Colin, If my memory is correct the injector hold down bolts on one of the Transit variants is around that too, and the fastening is around 100 mm long, and a single fastener holds down a pair of injectors by means of a bridge piece, and they are single use...
Compare that to the crank pulley bolt on the little 3-cylinder Focus engines which require beefy special tooling to restrain the crankshaft while the bolt was tightened (using a similarly chunky  torque multiplier) to spec. 
Interesting to reflect on the tightening advice of yesteryear: 'nip up' , 'tighten using a normal length spanner','thoroughly tighten' or my personal favourite 'a special wrench .....with a leverage of no less than 3 ft., will be required for this operation'.

[Jamie]

Hi Jamie 
I bought a Halfords 3/8" torque wrench but took it back because the range wasn't dead on for a seven (I'd already got a 1/2" 150 lbs/ft job) and setting it wasn't very certain. I bought a Britool AVT 300 A which is very simple and has a range up to 24 lbs/ft. Setting it to 19 rather than 20 for example is clear and easy, and its range suits the seven. A bit more money, but worth it I think.

Colin: is the Britool a ratchet or fixed head device?

[Colin Wilks]

It's not a ratchet, so you need to reposition the socket if you need more than 90° or so of rotation, which you either consider a faff, or, as I do, you reckon on it being a precision instrument, so the fewer moving bits the better.

I nip everything up with a normal ratchet and use the torque wrench just for final tightenng.

The handle conceals a pull out lever which sets the torque figure. Every 1 1/2 turns of this equals 1 lb/ft, so it is easy to set the torque figure cock on. One downside is you must return the wrench to its minimum setting after use to take the pressure off the spring.

I like it because you sneak up on the fastener in one smooth action and are rewarded with a very satisfying click as the handle gives. There is no tendency as with some to "give it a tickle for luck" due to reaching the final figure being a bit vague.

To get anticlockwise operation you push the square drive through to the other side.

Just realising I sound like a right anorak!

[Jamie]

Thank you for your detailed reply, Colin. I have not been able to find out much detail about them on the internet. I had been considering a Norbar, but i have reservations about the amount of plastic in the handle. The Britool looks more robust.

Jamie

[Jamie]

One Britool AVT300a ordered.