Im Pissed. Don't let Shops Use a Impact gun to Tighten your Lugnuts.

[PewterBird]

I oughta sue the tire place and the brake place for ****ing up my brakes. I got some tools and such for my bday and a torque wrench, jacks and a floor jack.
I am fixing my warped rotors this weekend, so tonight I took off my front wheels to inpect and to check things out before I get into it on Sat night.

When I got the front off the ground, I was suprised on how "freely" my wheels spin. The barely spun at all.

So I took the passenger side off, and check out my pads. The are always in contact with my rotors.

Is this normal?

So I played with the pedal and ebrake and turned the car on and off. Just to see if I could get them to release. Nope. Constant contact. I get out my gap measurement tool, goes down to the smallest of .04. Won't go through.

So I put the wheel back on and tightened it down to the OEM Spec of 100 ft lb ber lug. Now the wheel spins twice as freely. And I can still hear it the rotor and pad scraping, less but still scaping.

This has gotten been why my rotors warped. Excess heat?. This must keep my mileage just under 20mpg.

This will be my first brake job, Ill admit, Im no expert, but the pad can't really be suppose to be in contact with the rotor, it just doesn't make sense.

I should sue them for all the excess gas Ive wasted.

[skorpion317]

go for it....you'd probably win.

[speedy-v6-camaro]

Normal...our calipers are the floating kind...no amount of torque would do anything to your brakes....since the rotor spins free of the caliper.

[95Batmobile]

Mine are in contact all the time, its normal.

if you can spin the rotor by hand, they aren't too tight [img]smile.gif[/img]

If you have any problems let me know...

[BLLDOGG]

mine touches alittle but it is fairly easy to spin the wheels. i understand you anger about the warped calipers, have them too and it sucks

[ September 11, 2004, 03:52 AM: Message edited by: BLLDOGG ]

[PewterBird]

Originally posted by 95Batmobile:
Mine are in contact all the time, its normal.

if you can spin the rotor by hand, they aren't too tight [img]smile.gif[/img]

If you have any problems let me know...

With the wheel on and the front end up. How free should the wheel spin?

Originally posted by speedy-v6-camaro:
Normal...our calipers are the floating kind...no amount of torque would do anything to your brakes....since the rotor spins free of the caliper.

I noticed they are floating. With the wheel off, you can jiggle them back and forth. When the wheel is on you can no longer do that, because the wheel "presses" it into place. If my lugnuts were so tight it took a 12" 1/2 drive rachet and a cheater bar loosen them up, over twice the recomended torque. You don't suppose it could have been "pressed" hard enough into the innner pad, that it may have been "touching" to hard.

Whether or not it was the reason behind the warped rotors or not, really don't matter cause, they are warped, said and done.

But common sense and a little HS physics would make me think that a wheel with less rotational resistance would take less energy to rotate and keep rotating that a wheel with more resistance.

Less resistance, more mpg.

[95Batmobile]

Plus you're going to need the least friction possible to race me [img]tongue.gif[/img]

If you can spin it by hand then it should be fine..

[PewterBird]

Originally posted by 95Batmobile:
Plus you're going to need the least friction possible to race me [img]tongue.gif[/img]

If you can spin it by hand then it should be fine..

Im taking everything apart and painting them Saturday night. And putting all back together sunday.

Whatcha doing sunday?

[95Batmobile]

I just have a bunch of homework since my final is next week :(
If I can get it done I am down for whatever

[CaLiJeRk]

jeff... give me your address and a time to be there. my cell phone is outta order.

[HBHRacing]

have you ever seen a shop use wnything other then an impact? not unless it;s a wheel shop not wanting to runin the shiney wheels you just got from them. They would have to have there compressor turned up far too high and run the piss out of the lug nuts for it to be over tight. Impacts are designed to loosen more then they will tighten. It;s usualy a 60/40 gun.

The reason that they contact with the wheels off is because the force of the wheel holds the rotor on even. makeing them too tight will not cause excess heat. Rotors warping from over tightening the lugs are very rare. You stand more of a chance of having them warp do to hitting a cold puddle

[95Batmobile]

they'll warp if they aren't all torqued down to the same amount though..
and if they just used a gun to tighten them, they won't all be torqued to the same amount.

[HBHRacing]

sure they will.. the impact can only go so far. Tighten them in a star patern untill making contact and then the same amount of time on each again. It's fairly acurate. There are also "adapters" that will go on the impact and only alow for. 75 ft pounds, 100 ft pounds etc but I don't use them. If youl wanna be anal you can do it by spec. but from somone in the in industry if a customer told me that I warped there rotors by using an impact I would snicker at them when they left [img]smile.gif[/img]

[95Batmobile]

I just do what my dad tells me to, since he's been a mechanic for about 30 years [img]smile.gif[/img]

He says torque them.. I torque them [img]smile.gif[/img]

[HBHRacing]

It's one thing to do it yourself. It;s another thing for a shop to do it. If I started torquing lugnuts at work my boss would probably look at me funny.. and then fire me.