dolfinwriter
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Re: Torque Wrench for WD Hitch nylock nuts
The trailer and its contents are in Kansas now, and I am back in SoCal finishing packing, purging and working on my house. I'm thankful for the sway preventing hitch after driving though some beastly crosswinds in the mountains of I-8 east of San Diego, and in Arizona and New Mexico east of Flagstaff. Mine tracked straight and smooth the entire way. Saw an 18-wheeler on its side yesterday I believe near Winslow. I wondered if it was the same one I saw earlier in the day with the rear of its trailer crabbing sideways as much as 2 feet in the crosswinds. I saw a lot of RV trailers swaying a lot as well. Some of those were 5th wheel. On the way to Kansas, I stopped for gas at a Love's, and I happened to park next to someone pulling a camper trailer using the same hitch I have. I asked him how he torqued it and he said he guessed. He had two small boys in the back seat of his tow vehicle, and he's guessing at things like this. He also had the trunnion bars upside-down, so he doesn't follow instructions well.933Views0likes0CommentsRe: Torque Wrench for WD Hitch nylock nuts
BenK wrote: Me too...didn't know they made them that big and wonder if they provide enough "locking" force Think a split-ring should be added Super_Dave wrote: 360 ft-lbs and nylock nuts made me laugh. There is also a flat washer and a split ring lock washer. FWIW, the nuts that hold together some sea water components in nuclear submarines that have to withstand submergence pressure use nylock nuts on bolts that are at least two inches in diameter. These and all fasteners and software for systems that are exposed to submergence pressure are also QA'ed to the nth degree because of the Subsafe program implemented after we lost submarine Thresher. The only numbers I can state are what's been declassified at >800 ft depth, and 44#/100 ft of depth. That's 352 psi. Doesn't sound like a huge amount, but think of containing that kind of pressure in components the size of a pickup. Force = Pressure X Area. So yeah, they do make them much larger than this. I said before that I don't torque spec every single thing I work on, but on this hitch, it seems kind of important to have it tight enough but not overtight. One of the reviewers for this hitch said that he used what we called a "calibrated elbow" approach, and it came loose on him down the road and started swaying when trucks passed. He was smart enough to check it and had tools to tighten it, but would it have come loose at all if he had done it right?933Views0likes0CommentsRe: Torque Wrench for WD Hitch nylock nuts
I decided to just grind off the one weld bead in the middle and pry the tube away from the frame so I can slip the bracket between the frame and the tube. That leaves just one weld bead at each end of the three feet long tubes. I may slip a hose clamp or something over it to make sure it doesn't pop off, and I may eventually just cut the wires and remove these tubes, and then solder splice the wires and use plastic corrugate or something like that.935Views0likes0CommentsRe: Torque Wrench for WD Hitch nylock nuts
JIMNLIN wrote: I used my 24" adjustable wrench and a four foot 1 1/2" sch 40 pipe...then jumped on it with my 220 lbs. Working at the C-17 Tulsa mod center in '97. One big mil spec bolt into the wing spar had a 3400 ft lb torque. It took three 6' plus husky guys with a six foot 2" pipe on a torque multiplier to get'r done. The bolt could only be reached on top of the wing out on the very leading edge. Luckily I wasn't 6' tall. I won't give numbers, but the torque required for head bolts on a submarine nuclear reactor cannot be reached without thermal changes, and normally only done in a shipyard. Boeing didn't provide appropriate tools to do this wing job?935Views0likes0CommentsRe: Torque Wrench for WD Hitch nylock nuts
mkirsch wrote: dolfinwriter wrote: What amazes me is the most common response I have gotten is to take it to a semi or big rig maintenance facility and bother them to borrow a proper torque wrench for this. Is that really what most people who are doctors, lawyers, cybersecurity professionals, carpenters, electricians, teachers, bankers, police officers... do? I doubt most people even know where to find one. Most people pay the RV dealer to install the hitch. Not sure how they can do it if they don't have a torque wrench either.934Views0likes0CommentsRe: Torque Wrench for WD Hitch nylock nuts
Grit dog wrote: what makes you need all this hardware for a little cargo trailer? Plan on pulling it with a Hyundai or something? Any newer midsize pickemup or full size SUV, or larger should have no issue with a trailer that size unless it's loaded all wrong. Better to err on the side of caution, IF in fact I am erring at all... 2011 Tacoma Pre-Runner V-6. It's not a "little" cargo trailer, but I'm sure relative to a 33' camper trailer it might look that way. My Tacoma is rated for 6500 max towing, and I'm using every bit of it. Let's just say it's really heavy stuff that U-Haul won't allow in any of their vehicles or storage. Maybe some people would think it's overkill. I prefer to play it safe, especially when the lives of other people on the highways are at risk as well. If I was just tooling around town with it, it would certainly be ok. But I'm going to be crossing six states with it, with some mean crosswinds in some places. The reviews by people who've switched to this hitch from another are enough convincing for me. Now I've been delayed so much that snow has arrived in Arizona, New Mexico, Texas, Oklahoma and Kansas. You really ought to be condemning anyone NOT using one of these than condemning me for being safe. Oh but wait, there's more--I nearly finished setup last night and ran into a frame interference problem with the frame brackets. My trailer has a steel electrical conduit tube running along the trailer frame on both sides of the trailer on the inner side of the frame rails. This prevents the frame brackets from installing correctly. It looks like I have to modify my trailer to make this work. The only way I can see to do this is cut a section of the tubing out where the brackets need to be, and reroute the wiring--possibly snake them through the frame rail. Husky towing products tech support is absolutely no help. They say they've never seen this before! The trailer mfr tech support is absolutely no help. THEY say they've never seen this before! Maybe I would rethink buying this trailer if I had known this two months ago. What a PITA this whole thing has turned out to be. I'm also really curious how the wiring is routed on other trailers from the body of the trailer to the coupler and umbilical connector.365Views0likes0CommentsRe: Torque Wrench for WD Hitch nylock nuts
Durb wrote: Good decision. I hadn't realized digital in-line torque readers had become so inexpensive. They used to be a lot more expensive than a 3/4" torque wrench. Still make sure you support your work to the ground with a floor jack. Your torque reader will read 380 ft-lbs but the energy used to compress the truck's springs will not make it to tighten the fastener and you will be under torqued. I stumbled on that torque reader purely by accident. I think it's God's way of throwing me a lifeline on this :) Good point re: torque compressing truck springs. However, I think that would be countered or at least minimized by holding the bolt with the 1-1/8" box wrench. I will still support the hitch assembly with a floor jack just to be sure and make it more solid. I always check and re-check torque when there are more than one fastener. If any gives more movement than re-check all again.364Views0likes0CommentsRe: Torque Wrench for WD Hitch nylock nuts
After lining up all the bolts and checking them against the manual and kind of mock-up test fitting, they left off a 1-1/16" socket for the nylock nut on the 3/4" bolt and a 5/8" open end wrench for the square head frame bracket bolts. I could use a Crescent hammer for those, but adjustable wrench isn't listed either. So thank you to BenK for mentioning the bolt hex head size vs. bolt diameter, because that prompted me to verify everything I need. The 3/4" bolt hex head is 1-1/8", but the nylock nuts on those bolts are 1-1/16". Those 1-1/16" nylock nuts are the ones that need to be torqued to 380 ft-lbs. The install instructions leave a bit to be desired. Maybe they're written "correctly" for the way engineers think and talk, but most people putting this together won't be engineers. And if you assume that a 3/4" bolt means both hex head and nylock nuts are 1-1/8", then you'd be wrong. What amazes me is the most common response I have gotten is to take it to a semi or big rig maintenance facility and bother them to borrow a proper torque wrench for this. Is that really what most people who are doctors, lawyers, cybersecurity professionals, carpenters, electricians, teachers, bankers, police officers... do? I doubt most people even know where to find one. Probably the second most common is some version of a "calibrated elbow" approach. I don't torque spec every single thing I work on that lists a torque spec, but torque specs exist to ensure that things are properly tightened, but at the same time not OVER-tightened. This seems like something where it is really important to get it right. One of the reviews of this was a user who winged it, and down the road it came loose. He was smart enough to be checking it at intervals, so he caught it and had tools to tighten it. But would it have come loose at all if he'd gotten the torque to spec to begin with? So I bought a 3/4" breaker bar, a 3.4" torque adapter (https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B009GLITFW/ref=ppx_yo_dt_b_asin_title_o00_s01?ie=UTF8&psc=1), and a 3/4" 6-pt impact rated socket set w/ratchet and extensions. It's costing me about as much as the proper rated torque wrench by itself, but I'll do this right and I'll have some versatile tools for future use.364Views0likes0CommentsRe: Torque Wrench for WD Hitch nylock nuts
BenK wrote: A 3/4" bolt will have a hex head with 1.125" across the flats Therefore, needs a 1 1/8" socket I think you're right, but they left that out of the list of tools needed. Looks like I need to go check every fastener and make sure exactly what I need and not trust the manual that came with it. That will definitely be a comment in my review of this thing later!324Views0likes0Comments
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