SoreFeet

You don't need feel bad. Most bike shops in my area appear to be completely ignorant about torque. In fact one rider going up a hill had his fancy outboard bottom bracket crank arm come loose and separate...

It probably was torqued to spec on a park tool

DMF 

I gather you haven't read the rest of the thread...



...or was that a joke?

Breako21

I use 2 Hazet click style torque wrenches on my bike for everything up to 20nm. Accurate to within 3%, and more than accurate enough for ANY bicycle part, including parts that involve carbon fiber. For the bottom bracket, cassette, etc... I use an older model Park Tool TW-2 beam style torque wrench. Very easy to recalibrate by hand on the rare occasions it needs adjustment, and a perfectly suitable tool for those bicycle jobs.

Snap-On tools are not needed for any bicycle application. Not even by a pro race mechanic. Go check any of the actual tool boxes of 4+ dozen random world class bike mechs, who wrench for world class DH or XC MTB racers, and I’ll guarantee you that you will not find Snap-On or MAC tools nor Precision Instruments torque wrenches in even 5% of those Tool boxes.

Your rant sounds like you’re an angry Snap-on wholesaler or something? And if you think bike shops charge labor rates that approach a quality Porsche work shop rate you have obviously never owned a Porsche. I’ve owned multiple 911 Turbos, and I can assure you the shop labor costs of maintaining such a machine dwarf what any bicycle shop charges for labor.

Now I do agree with you that the Park Tool TW 5.2 and 6.2 are silly priced given that they are essentially nothing but rebadged cheap generic Amazon-Neiko type $30 torque wrenches. Anyone that paid over $100 for either of them got hosed. That said, one does not need a $500 torque wrench to successfully wrench on bicycles. My Hazet click style torque wrenches were bought on sale for between $110 to $150 each (models 5107-2CT, 5108-2CT, and a 5110-2CT). I always reset them to 0 after each use, and get them recalibrated every 2 years. I use them mainly on my cars, which was the primary reason I bought them. The only ones that get used on my bicycles are the 5107 and 5108. I would dare anyone to claim or try to prove they are inadequate for bicycle maintenance because they are click style torque wrenches given they are the exact same model torque wrenches we regularly used on the Porsche F1 development team for numerous applications when I worked for them. There is nothing wrong with a click style TW for bicycle use so long as you ALWAYS reset it to 0 after EVERY use, have it properly calibrated, buy a decent quality wrench, and get it recalibrated every few years or after an abusive type incident like dropping it. FYI,?you don’t need to be at 1% or even 2% torque accuracy for any bicycle components. That’s nonsense! These are not NASA space shuttles being worked on, they are bicycles. In addition, bicycle CF component makers have torque specs that are so conservative that any decently calibrated and decent quality TW will get you where you need to be safely.

Bill Kapaun

Is this a new ZOMBIE thread record?
21 years 4 months 6 days since last responded to!

Breako21

Sorry, this came up in my feed, and I was not looking at dates. 😆

Cyclist0108

Just out of curiosity, what year is it where you live?

Russ Roth

Quite the rant against what is a 12 year old thread. Nothing wrong with a little Snap-on in the tool box just isn't as completely necessary as the car guys like to think, but show me a better set of reversible ratchet wrenches, I've got a nice run of their straight beam combination ratchet wrenches and its what I keep in my box paired with wright combo wrenches. My box has a nice mix of wright, SK, bondhus, wheels manufacturing, and park based on who makes what best and a good mechanic picks and chooses based on use and quality.

veganbikes

I don't know how such an old thread could wind up in someones daily feed as something hot and new and why someone would get so spicy over it.

Actually a lot of pro-mechanics use Snap-On some may use it less because customs and security like to take the stuff but our shop has a lot of mechanics using Snap-On and it is hard to not, they are good quality tools with good support behind them. Yeah sure they are not cheap but if I do happen to break one, I just call up my Snap-On guy and give him the tool and he gets me a new one. Granted I haven't had to replace anything yet but have had other staff who have.

Sure maybe not needed but you could then say that about any tools and we could say all you need are the leftover wrenches from Ikea to build a proper tool box and we all know that is B.S. As I always say buy good tools once and don't have to buy them again.

veganbikes

Actually I feel it has come up a lot recently in various threads.

Melvang

Reading through this thread, I was wondering if someone was going to mention this.

I have used this method for studs with a "torque spec" of 40,000 foot pounds. The nuts were 6 7/8" flat to flat and the socket was 45 pounds. For those you measure the length of the stud with a blind hole in the stud with a depth micrometer, heat the stud in the same hole with induction, and run the but down by hand. Let cool, remeasure for stretch and calculate the torque.

70sSanO

Well I guess that crank is coming loose.

John

Reflector Guy

Yikes, what are they building? Giant antennas or something? We have a variety here at the office (for checking bolted connections in buildings) but I think the biggest one goes to "only" 1000 ft/lbs.

I have a hard time imagining a pro measuring the bolt stretch on a bicycle bolt that might only be torqued to, say, five or ten Nm. Maybe they measure it with an electron microscope?

I think that for bikes, the challenge would be finding a torque wrench that goes low enough to be accurate at the really low end of the scale.