Torque Wrenches - my answer... (holy smokes!)

[SJ]

> From: "Ingo D. Rautenberg" <ingo at waratap.com>
> Subject: Re: Re:Torque Wrenches - my answer... (holy smokes!)
> To: "Kneale Brownson" <knotnook at traverse.com>, <quattro at audifans.com>
>
> Ok, so now what?  Do we know how long the extension is of tool 2079?
**** Yes, we do know the length of tool 2079. I drove to the dealer today
and verified that the tool is indeed 12.0 inches long as measured from the
center of the socket to the center of the driving hole.
When I asked the service manager about the length of the torque wrench, he
said that they no longer had the "old original" wrench. And he spread out
his hands and said "the one we use is about this long". I measured the
distance between his hands and it was 2.5 feet.
When I asked him about the torque values etc. He said that they dont use
tool 2079. They torque the bolt directly with the wrench . . .to 250 ft lbs.
When I mentioned the 258 ft lb spec and showed him the location in the
manual . . . his eyes glazed over. Trying to explain the torque multiplying
action of tool 2079 was totally beyond his comprehension and grasp.
He once worked on these cars before being promoted to Service Manager. Maybe
it was your car he worked on . . . .is that why your crank pulley fell off?

 >And IIRC, the torque wrench required (and the one I bought) is of the 3/4"
> variety.  They seem to be pretty much one standard length  -- which is
> another reason this is not mentioned in the Audi literature.
**** I have a 1/2 wrench that is 1.46 feet long. I think you will find a
difference in lengths if you buy a 3/4 wrench whose scale ends at 350 ft
lbs, or a 3/4 wrench whose scale starts at 300 ft lbs and ends at 700 ft
lbs.

> Furthermore,  torque values specified are what? -- 350 Nm / 258 lb ft as
indicated on
> torque wrench with tool 2079 (or equivalent) or  450 Nm / 332 lb ft
without.
**** The only specified torque value is the 258 ft lbs using tool 2079.
Where does your 332 ft lbs value come from?

> I find the discussion, while not arbitrary, somewhat pointless in that IF
> you follow proper procedure AND you use the proper tools, you will have
the
> intended result.  Just don't tell me you're using some special shorty 3/4"
> torque wrench -- I don't buy it.
**** Well, some of us dont have tool 2079. Maybe we have a big enough wrench
to work on the crank bolt directly. Or, we only have a shorty 1/2 wrench . .
. . poor me.
If you follow the proper procedure and use the proper tools, you still dont
know what you are doing. Thats what this discussion is finding out.

>
> Can we agree that most 3/4" torque wrenches are in the 32"-42" range?  I
> honestly don't recall the size of the 2079 -- but based on my observation
> and calculations given the torque values above, it would be ~11".  Is that
> about right?  Bueller? Bueller? Oh, and BTW,
**** 32" wrench will result in 355 ft lbs on the bolt. A 42" wrench will
result in 343 ft lbs on the bolt.
Close enough for government work.
Tool 2079 is exactly 12.0 between centers.
But you still dont know what the bolt torque is supposed to be. What if the
engineer who worked on this was a newbie fresh from college, and not knowing
any better he used my wrench to set the bolt torque and compute the tool
2079 torque. Then the bolt torque should be 405 ft lbs.
Maybe the engineer's supervisor caught him doing something dumb and gave him
a real accurate torque wrench . . .except this thing was 5 feet long. Then
the bolt torque would be 310 ft lbs.
Will the real bolt torque number please stand up!

Granted that most of this discussion is academic. 90% of us use the 2 or 3
grunt method of torquing. According to most of the testimonials . .its good
enough.

I wanted to actually make an extender, which is in that link that you posted
. .which is the same link I posted a day or two ago.
Not only do I want to make an extender, but I want one that will work in the
midrange of my torque wrench and not at the top end of the wrench scale.
Not only do I want to make one extender, I wanted to make a generic 2X
extender. And an extender for my in lb wrenches.
In going thru the calculations for making the right length extender, things
were not making sense. And thats how this thread got started.

>for those having a difficult time comprehending torque multipliers and
such, just check out:
>
> http://www.specialpatrolgroup.co.uk/spooky/torque/torque.html
>
> Then make your own tool.
**** That is a good site. But, the author makes no mention of the effect
that the wrench length has on the final torque. Most of these sites fail to
mention that. I grasped the significance of the relationship only after I
plotted the data on a chart. That is one reason we had such a lengthy thread
on the topic. We had to figure things out on our own.
It is no big deal if you only have one extender and one torque wrench. But
what if you have several extenders and several torque wrenches .  . .and
your friends borrow your tools.

Just remember that when your neighbor borrows the extender, make sure he
realizes that the numbers only work with your wrench.

SJ
85 Dodge PU, D-250, 318, auto
85 Audi 4k - - sold but still on the road
88 Audi 5kq
90 Audi 100q