Car: 92 Civic LX

Just finished my first major project - replacing my CV shafts which went as well as I could have hoped. But I have a noob question.

I borrowed my friends impact gun which I mostly just used to loosen all the bolts and then used a torque wrench to tighten most of them back up to spec.

I read that your supposed to tighten the damper-fork-to-lower-control-arm bolt with the car on the ground. It was tough to get into the wheel well with my torque wrench so I just used the lowest setting on the impact gun (it had two settings) to tighten the nut on the damper-fork-to-lower-control-arm bolt and then check to make sure it was at least the 32 ft-lbs that it should be at. It definitely was at 32 ft-lbs because my torque wrench clicked without tightening the nut any further. Before I started the job my friend told me that I wouldn't over torque anything if I use the low setting. I guess it could be over torqued since 32 ft-lbs isn't much but I guess probably not by much since my friend didn't seem to thing the wrench would over torque anything on the lowest setting.

If it was you would you loosen this bolt up and redo it with the torque wrench or just not worry about it?

 

for things like that I've always done good n tight which is usually the equivalent to most suspension TQ specs.

 

...idk if I'd go that far.

OP, you're fine. You're supposed to tighten ANY non floating bushing that has to pivot in the same fashion as you did.

A tip for next time: you can use a jack on the LCA while all the other corners are on stands. Put the pad right at the tightened ball joint and lift. That way you can torque everything down

Don't sweat what you did. Kudos to not tightening the bolts on the ground like 99.9% of people.

 

spherical bearings in the front in my case, sorry I misread his question too I tough he was asking if he had to tighten it to the exact spec with a wrench. If you work flat rate in a shop it's basically impossible to TQ everything to spec with a tq wrench I speak from current personal experience. I'd be gone pretty fast if I did it that way sadly I'm just an apprentice at VW lol.

 

Another trick, if you are like me and like to attempt torquing as much as possible to spec, to be able to load the suspension for torquing is to drop the wheels onto ramps. That raises the car about a foot into the air while the car acts like it's sitting on the ground.

This will let you get to most bolts under the car with a torque wrench and is a bit more stable than a jack under one of the control arms.

I suspect your friends impact hammer probably is going to about 35 ft-lbs on it's lowest setting. An easy way to test is to loosen a lug nut on your car, impact it on the lowest setting and start working up from 30 ft-lbs on the torque wrench until the lug nut turns. Then you know it's typical torque on low. Just be sure to torque the lug back down to 80 ft-lbs.

Cheers. And congrats on your cv joints.

 

As long as you can read a wiring diagram and operate a fire extinguisher, VW will always need you.

Actually, I believe that to become a master tech, you just have to be able to do both simultaneously.

 

Thanks. Good advice.

 

Don't worry, a bit over torque is nothing. Bolt threads can take alot.

 

We've had zero cars with electrical issues since I started in September lol

 

That's some sort of world record