you might brake it free with a 5ft bar but 4ft may not do it

 

This is a bolt with only a 19mm head, right? It is almost incredible that a bolt, supposedly tightened to "only" 160 ft-lb, can ever become that tight or "stuck", but because so many people on this and other fourums claim that it is so, it must indeed be true. How the smaller-diameter shaft of the bolt, where it meets the head, can withstand this kind of loosening force (a FIVE FOOT bar on a 19mm bolt?!) without shearing is simply mind-boggling to me.

The local Honda service dept tech I talked to said that "almost all of the time" their 1/2" pneumatic wrench removes that bolt. Sometimes they have to resort to a bigger, 3/4" drive pneumatic wrench, but that is rare.

I believe this is true because I had tried in vain to loosen an axle nut using a 1/2" breaker bar which had on it at least a 3 foot extension. I put so much force on the thing that the breaker bar was bending to the point where I was afraid it would snap.

That nut defeated me, Isaac Newton's lever, and probably over 1200 ft-lbs of torque. But, amaizingly to me, a small Honda tech, using only his short arms, was able to free it by simply holding a 1/2"-drive air wrench on it for just a few minutes. Seeing wheel lug nuts being removed is one thing, but seeing that wrench remove what Isaac and I could not was quite something else. If I hadn't seen it with my own eyes, I wouldn't have believed it possible.

So the unique banging, striking, rattling force that these wrenches transmit to the fastener must contribute something very important to the loosening "equation" that the simple, steady, twisting motion of a lever cannot. That is pretty comforting to realize.

Therefore, rather than take the car to Honda, I'm going to either rent or buy an electric wrench which is powerful enough to do the job. Because I'll probably pay at least $20 to $30 to rent, I'd like to instead put that money toward a tool that I've always kind of wanted, but never could adequately justify buying. This proverbial "tough nut to crack" now provides such justification.

Here's a good candidate that I just dicoverd this morning and I'm pretty excited about it:
http://www.ridgid.com/Tools/R6300-Im...ench/index.htm

Anyone here own this wrench and , if so, what do you think of it?

According to the Ridgid specifications, this wrench has similar torque to much-heavier 3/4" units built by other manufacturers. If anything, Ridgid is usually is conservative in their specifications, so likely the 450 ft-lb is not BS.

Because of it's relatively light weight and small size, it looks like it might be a very versatile, very usable, all-purpose tool.

But the big question is: do those of you who have personally loosened that bolt think that this tool will loosen it if I let it beat on the little bugger for say five minutes, or even an hour?

One thing that I think is important is that, fortunately, if I buy the Ridgid tool from an authorized retailer (such as Home Depot), there's a 90-day, money-back, satisfaction guarantee. If for any reason I find the tool unsatisfactory, I can return it for a full refund.

So I could buy it in the morning, let it succeed or fail on that crank bolt, then return it or not return it based on whether it does the job.

Can't beat that scenario, except that if it fails to remove the bolt, I'm back to "square one".

 

I personally have never even used an electric one... However, knowing how I have a tendancy to have stupid stuff happen I'd be one of those guys that throws it onto a lug nut and accidentaly hits forward instead of reverse and shears something off.... Personally I don't like that "rocker" switch for direction but that's just me... That's going to be 10 times better than just a wrench....

Long and short: doesn't look like a bad setup for most jobs, will be much better than doing it by hand however I still think that an air gun would be better yet... it's just a personal preferance on that.... but if it does the job, it does the job...

 

Yes, I know, pound-for-pound an air wrench is more powerful than an electric, but I do not want to buy another, larger compressor. Electric tools are a heck of a lot quieter than most air tools, too.

Speaking of power, I briefly considered this one until I read how heavy it is:
http://www.makita.com/menu.php?pg=product_det&tag=6910


The physical dimensions aren't so much different than the Ridgid, and the all-aluminum body, 15 AMP motor, and max torque of 733 ft-lbs are amazing, but get a load of the weight - almost 20 ibs. How useful is ANY tool going to be that weighs in at 20 lbs? (Proabably it's intended as a light-industrial tool.)

I like and appreciate its old world craftsmanship, reliability and longevity - but 20 lbs?

I'd use it for the pulley bolt and the axle nut MAYBE every few years, but likely that would be the only time I'd pick it up. For example, there's no way I'll remove wheel nuts with it. It would be far easier to just pick up a 1/2" socket wrench! The Ridgid, on the other hand, is light enough to also be practical.

But, even with all of that being said, I still wouldn't mind having that Makita - if only just to pick up and admire once in awhile.

 

what price range are you looking at?

 

Well, I'm pretty disappointed, but enlightened.

I contacted a Canadian eBay seller who's selling the Ridgid wrench and I asked why he's selling the tool, and what had he used it for.

He replied that he had bought it less than a month ago from a US eBay seller in order to remove some 30mm axle nuts. (Wow, great minds think alike.)

Anyway, he had tried to remove them with a breaker bar, but that didn't work, so he bought the Ridgid. When it did not do the job, he went to a longer cheater and he was finally successful.

Now he's selling the tool after less than one month of ownership.

Not a happy outcome, but it didn't cost me a drop of sweat, or a skinned knuckle, to find out that there's more than a good chance that the Ridgid will not loosen that bolt.

So the Ridgid is "out" and the saga continues.

But there's light at the end of the tunnel.

A couple of days ago I contacted a man who's selling a older, well-used, now-obsolete Bosch 1435R. It is similar to the Makita I described above, but it weighs about 15 lbs, instead of the Makita's 20. Significantly to me, the seller says that it has removed bolts that his IR2141 couldn't budge - specifically, crank pulley bolts on Toyotas and Honda Civics. In his daily work he used it quite often as the tool of last resort - even once on a bridge - and he claims it never failed to remove any fastener he put it on.

As I said above, I wouldn't consder such a beast, but this one is cheap compared to the Makita.

I'm now leaning more toward renting a monster electric, but it might be nice to have a tool of last resort ready to come to the rescue should the need arise. After all, I've needed exactly that twice in the last few weeks.

Am I just making excuses to own a monster wrench?

Just how WILL I finally get that bolt out of there?

Stay tuned.

 

About $300.

 

Tony my man.........if you plan on doing a lot of your own work which seems to me that you are .
I would strongly suggest that you invest some money on a compressor and some air tools.........Air tools are to a tech what a hammer is to a carpenter ,
the air impact that i personally use is INGERSOLL RAND .....but you can go to the local SEARS store and check theirs out .get the one with the high power, so you can remove crank bolts ,, you can always adjust the power down .,, get a air rachet as well .if you got the extra money i would get 2 air rachets,,,,,,,1 low torque high speed for the smaller bolts ( 5, 6 mm , ) and 1 low speed higher torque for the bigger bolts ( 8, 10, mm )..

using air tools ,you will be amazing how much faster the job can be done ,, that/s what helps us techs flag a lot of hrs working the flat rate system

 

Desert, nice to hear from you again.

I really do believe what everyone says about pneumatic tools, but if you saw my garage, and knew my wife, you'd understand why I cannot buy another compressor. I'm very lucky that my wife is "allowing" me to buy an electric impact and it is a bit ironic that the crank bolt has provided me with the reason.

I don't mind at all turning a wrench by hand. In fact, I find it very theraputic - when things go well, that is.

Remember, I am not a professional tech, so I really don't care one bit how long a job takes. But I DO want to be able to finish, uninterrupted by a stubborn fastener, any job I undertake on the car. Not to exagerate the point, but it gives me a sense of independence and controlling my own destiny.

Back to my impact wrench saga.

I received additinal information from the owner of that Ridgid impact wrench. After he wrote to me telling me that the tool had failed to remove the axle nut, I replied that I was sorry, etc., but I also asked him how he had used the tool, and related my experience with my own axle nut (that didn't sound right) and having to finally give up and take it to Honda, where they then had to put the air wrench on the nut for a considerable length of time.

He wrote back again last night to tell me that he had put the wrench on the nut for "only maybe" 10 seconds a couple of different times and, when the nut did not immediately loosen, he figured that the tool was inadequate for the job.

Well, from my experience at Honda, I know that how he used the tool was inadequate to conclude anything about whether it was capable of removing that nut.

Also, I apparently misunderstood what he said he has accomplished so far - specifically, that he has NOT yet removed the nut. He only PLANS to use a longer lever to remove the nut and he figures that this will be successful in the end.

So I wrote to him again and recommended that he let the tool bang away on that nut for a good 5 minutes before he decides that it is inadequate for the job.

I haven't heard back from him yet, but I wouldn't be a bit surprised if it removes the nut and, in that case, I'd probably get one of those Ridgid impact wrenches for myself.

If you want to be further bored to death, please read on. (Now you can really tell that I'm retired.)

I was so amazed by how that Honda tech was able to remove our Accord's axle nut, that, since that time, I've done some further thinking about it and I think I've come up with something that all of you have probably known since the day of your first ride in an automobile.

But it's all new to me, so here goes.

I'm now thoroughly convinced that the banging action of an impact wrench, COMPELTELY SEPARATE FROM THE TORQUE, is much more important than brute torque in removing fasteners. (I now also do not believe that the crank pulley bolt gets "torqued tighter" over time.)

How can I come to that conslusion?

As that chart I posted earlier shows, ALL impact wrenches reach their maximum torque within a few seconds of continuous operation against a resisting, unmoving fastener.

But the obvious fact is that the fastener does not loosen at that time.

If the maximum torque being exerted by the impact wrench exceeds the original tightening torque of the fastener, why does the fastener not loosen at that time?

It doesn't loosen because there logically MUST be "something else", other than torque, that's resisting the loosening of the fastener.

Because impact wrenches SUCCEED - at LOWER torque - in doing what a man with a lever FAIL to do - at MUCH HIGHER torque - it MUST be that the banging and vibrating action of the impact tool works COMPLETELY INDEPENDENTLY of its torqueing ability!

And it also follows that both the INTENSITY and RAPIDITY, of the hammering vibration must (for the removal of a single fastener) determine the length of time that it takes to "work on" whatever that "something else" is that resists the fastener's loosening.

If what I've said above is true, to me it is clear that, in that case of a crank pulley bolt that was originally tightened to 160 ft-lb, it is at least theoretically possible to loosen the bolt with ANY impact wrench that is capable of applying torque ABOVE 160 ft-lb. How long it takes such a wrench to remove the bolt will depend ENTIRELY on its ability to apply the banging and vibration necessary to "neutralize" or "GET MOVING" the "something else" that's holding the bolt in place!

On the face of it, this sounds utterly ridiculous, but think about it - what, exactly, was the "missing ingredient" when Isaac and I could not budge our Accord's axle nut with over 1200 ft-lbs of torque?

The one and only reason I've bothered to post all of this is that I think that it's quite possible - especially in the case of this 19mm crank pulley bolt - that one could indeed shear the head off the bolt by using the brute force of a lever alone.

Here's why.

I think that whatever that "something else" is, it exists BETWEEN, or ON, the threads of the bolt and the threaded hole, and NOT between the bottom of the head of the bolt and its flat mating surface on the crank shaft. So the bolt head almost immediately begins to "slide" against the surface of the crank shaft as soon as torque starts to be applied to the head and the friction between those two flat surfaces is overcome.

I therefore think that it is absolutely essential to remove the bolt with the LEAST amount of torque.

As I think I've proven above, the one and only way to do that is by using a banging, vibrating impact wrench.

Make sense to anyone other than me?

(Even though I've never owned or operated one, I already love an impact wrench!)

 

As I stated earlier, I have removed the pulley nut by using the starter. It has worked every time, but I am not telling anyone else to do it because you do have to be careful!!!! And the engine rotation has to be correct or you will be in big trouble!!!

The lug nuts on my one ton truck are torqued to 140 ft. lbs., but it takes more that that to loosen one after it sits awhile. I keep a long breakover bar plus a pipe in my truck to extend my leverage so the nut breaking torque has to be well over 300 ft. lbs. My impact wrench will remove the nut if I do it soon after torquing the nut, but not months later.

For other nuts, anti-seize compound on the threads (a real no-no on lug nuts) will keep the threads and nut mating surface from trying to fuse together. Corrosion also plays a factor. A light body penetrant oil can help in nut removal as well as a torch. I have a aircraft welder's torch that has a very small flame that I use a lot of time on nuts when all other means fail. Again, I am not telling anyone else to do that because you might start a fire!!! I have saved more money by having that torch than all of my other tools. I always discard those nuts since the strength has been compromised by the heat.