overcoming minor problems-handy dandy tool- axle nut size?

[TOW'D]

Howdy Gang,
 I just had the pleasure of replacing my '85 golf front struts and figured out a good use for a broken wrench.
I have a old 1/2" Craftsman ratchet that had the ballbearing that holds the socket on the 1/2" shaft.
pretty handy when it was all there but mine is missing all the parts that hold/release the socket.
My 6 or 7 mm allen wrench fits right down the drive and makes it easy to remove/install the top nut on that strut.


hope that helps somebody else.

Anybody happen to know the size of the front axle nut ?
cheers
hank

[jtanguay]

i believe the front axle nut is 30 or 32mm

[blkboostedtruck]

30mm

Duane

[burn_your_money]

yes 30mm.

Another thing to do if you don't have a broken ratchet is to use vise grips on the socket. It would be ideal to notch it a bit to get a better grab.

[lord_verminaard]

30mm

Duane

And, dont even try to break it free without a giant breaker bar, or even a pipe.  I needed a 6' pipe, with me hanging on it while my girlfriend put the car in 4th gear and held the brakes.   :shock:

Brendan

[zukgod1]

I just use my big Green Mac Air Impact Wrench.
Comes right off   :twisted:

[Pat Dolan]

Axle nuts work just fine with a 1 3/16" impact socket (not as common as some sizes, but in a lot of places easier than the correct metric one).

I find that I need a 3/4" impact to break old ones loose, whereas a 1/2" works fine for something that has been together only a few months or years.

[tSoG-84bit]

30mm

Duane

And, dont even try to break it free without a giant breaker bar, or even a pipe.  I needed a 6' pipe, with me hanging on it while my girlfriend put the car in 4th gear and held the brakes.   :shock:

Brendan

I never had that problem... although my options at the time were "break it lose with a 30mm impact socket on a 10" craftsman ratchet." or "ride home in the back of a toyota celica convertible." Lets just say I was motivated to get it off..

we did it with the wheel off, and a busted CV, and shot brakes...

[lord_verminaard]

Interesting story since I last wrote that- I had to do both axles in my Scirocco, so joy for me I get the task of breaking free unknown axle nuts.  I lubed them up good with PB blaster every day for three days before I decided to work on it....  Turns out I nearly killed myself AND the car in the process.

I had a 1/2" breaker bar, attached to a 3-foot piece of pipe, and when bouncing on that setup with all my weight didn't work, I added the jack handle to the piece of pipe, and stood on that- well, there was enough flex in the pipe to bend quite a bit, so I had to position the breaker bar at around the 11:00 position, then carefully put my weight on it until it flexed almost level with the ground.  Well, I was bouncing, and the jack handle popped out of the pipe, which sent me crashing to the ground, and catapulted the pipe about 30 feet straight up in the air, directly over my car.  As I was laying on the ground figuring out what was going on, all I could do was watch the pipe fall right at my car.  By some force of dumb luck, it hit the foam Zender hatch spoiler that I had just installed a few months ago and missed the metal or glass parts of the hatch all together and didn't do any damage to anything.  At that point, I got out the torch but it still took a lot of force to break it free.   I think I calculated it to being something like 1435 foot-pounds of torque at one point with just me standing on the bar, and bouncing on it would have made something like 2150 foot-pounds of break torque.  :shock:

Brendan

[saurkraut]

Man, you guys have rust worse than here, and we salt everything that dosen't move in the winter...

On my '79 rabbit (stored winters), I just use a standard breaker bar with the wheel on the ground.  Not a whole bunch of effort required.

And I think the installation torque in the Bently is something like 164 Ftlbs or so.  My memory sucks, so have I to look it up every time...

[jtanguay]

is it okay to use anti seize on the axle nuts like wheel lugs? i'd assume that it would... would the torque need to be compensated though???

[lord_verminaard]

I used some anti-seize.  

And the proper torque for it is 195 ft-lbs.  Although it is common for some racers and auto-x'ers to torque the living crap out of it, which I think is what happened to mine, as it used to spend some time on the track.  I've even heard of people attaching the socket, laying it on the ground and either backing the car up/pulling forward to put torque on the nut.   :shock:

Brendan

[jtanguay]

I used some anti-seize.  

And the proper torque for it is 195 ft-lbs.  Although it is common for some racers and auto-x'ers to torque the living crap out of it, which I think is what happened to mine, as it used to spend some time on the track.  I've even heard of people attaching the socket, laying it on the ground and either backing the car up/pulling forward to put torque on the nut.   :shock:

Brendan

wouldn't overtorquing wreck the bearing???  with anti seize the actual torque is increased because there is less friction right??? or is the anti seize just that, anti seize, but not good lubricant???

[lord_verminaard]

From what I hear, over-torquing the axle nut actually helps save the front wheel bearing from deformation during high-speed cornering and high side-loads, it's been known that a catastrophic front-bearing failure under race conditions like that (stress failure caused by metal fatigue) can actually snap the hub and send a front wheel flying off the car.  But yeah, it's probably not wise to do that on a street car.

Anti-seize is not a great lubricant but I'm sure that it would make a marginal difference in torque numbers.  But then again, most torque wrenches are quite inaccurate anyway.

Brendan

[Smokey Eddy]

OK,
uhhhh.... How hard is too hard to have to push/pull to undo that nut as seen in the picture up top?
My friend and i bent the allan key we were using and made really awesome grind marks with the vise grips on the socket.... :roll:

Any ideas? we were going to grind flat spots on the socket and use a big wrench! but the allan key was the weak point last time...
Would putting a cheater bar (pipe) on the allan prevent the bending if i had the pipe right at the bend? That would spread out the force on it

Any ideas on making it come loose easier? My car looks rediculous with coilies slamming it in the back and the stock springs + big tires making it look like its constantly taking off