Does clicking a torque wrench more than once add torque each time.

I had a discussion with a guy today that said once the torque wrench clicks, you should not click it again. His claim was that each time you click the wrench it adds a little more torque.

I usually click mine 3 times just to be sure. If doing my lugs nuts, I usually check them the next day just to be sure they are tight. He says, doing this results in an over torqued lug nut?

BTW, I usually set my wrench to 86 ft/lbs on the lug nut. (Aluminum mag seat wheels)

 

Depends on the wrench, but typically no. You can click all you want and it will be fairly accurate.

What I do is repeat the star pattern, rather than click 3 times on a lug.

A click doesn't always mean its torqued, it can still turn as the wheel is seating. So repeating the pattern applies even torque and you get the validation of the extra click.

 

Yeah, I alway torque in a star pattern.
Then make a circle and double check.

Since you are a tech, have you ever had lug move just a little bit on a follow up check. (Like the second time you checked them)

Oddly enough I have, but only once.

I use a Husky (Home Depot) Click wrench. It’s not a split beam or electric.

 

This depends entirely on proper use. I would think that is somewhat is partially true. But not enough torque to consider it over torqued. It should only ever get to the nominal value set plus the max tolerance of the wrench.

 

Not a tech, but i've only had it move on VW's. Toyota/GM/Dodge no movement. I think because of the lug bolts they use.

 

Yup, lugs move all the time on second torque. Toyota lugs especially as they are hub centric, so its a flat washer pressing on the wheel.

I live in a rust area, so ensuring the lugs are seating properly is a must.

New vehicles I don't worry, but 5 lug Tundras are the big concern, as they give "false clicks" due to corrosion and rough seating some of the wheels have.

Clean the hubs, light lubrication and make sure all is well and you won't have issues.

 

If it rotates with a second click then the first click was not at full torque.

If it does not rotate then you can click as many times as you want, you have reached full torque

If you a gorilla you can keep pushing after the torque and fail to follow directions.

 

As a full time Tech, I’d say you get a “feel for it”. You can probably tell if it “isn’t quite right”.

I’m not a tech. I just don’t have a lot of money to spend to let other guys work on my truck.
I absolutely hate working on vehicles. And I actually don’t mind at all if other people work on mine. (Unlike a lot on this forum)

I know I post a lot on this forum. As I am the type that like to learn “How things work”, but definitely don’t like working on them. And I guess I genuinely “Like helping people”.
I do landscape and lawn care for work.

I don’t talk about it much, but I am clinically diagnosed with OCD. So I definitely get nervous thinking I’ve over torqued or under torqued a bolt. It is weird how OCD works. When I was younger, I never worried about. (Mostly because I didn’t know better)

 

So you are saying that once it clicks, if I keep on push until I hear another click, that is bad, right?

Honestly, I never torqued anything in my life until I joined this forum.
Thanks, now you guys got me all paranoid about torque specs.

 

A couple things to get an accurate torque. If you have the type with a spring, you turn a dial to put tension against the spring. To keep it accurate you need to back off the dial to relieve the tension against the spring. Then set it to the desired number before use. The split beam type, I think it isn’t necessary.

My snap on dude has a torque calibrator in his truck. I’ve tested my 1/2 drive split beam, at 90 the calibrator says it’s about 87. I’ve never checked my 3/8 inch pound wrench.

In my railroad days, we were required to have every measurement tool calibrated certified traceable to nist. Everything, tape measures, rulers, pressure gauges, even the welding machines. Using the big 3/4 drive torque wrench required it be tested and recorded before use, and again after use. Then the dot auditors would dig through the records to look for mistakes. They dinged me for not having a written procedure for disposal of a failed measuring instrument.

 

I use mine so infrequently I finally took it out of my toolbox. I still have it, I think I could find it if I need it.

 

I do back off the tension on the spring after each use.
And most of the time, if I have time, I test it on a larger bolt just to make sure it’s “working”.
For example, if I’m using a 3/8” wrench, and the bolt calls for 35 ft/lb. I’ll test it on a lug nut just to be sure it’s going to work.

I actually had a 1/4 drive NOT work.
Helped my brother do a water pump (2013 Ram 5.7), the bolts called for 18 to 21 ft/lb.
The wrench never did anything. Thank goodness I checked it.

To beat it all, my father’s truck need a water pump about 6 months later. Same truck and engine.
Needless to say, we went by feel and “so far so good”.


One thing I’m finding is, a good wrench is Expensive!

 

I used to enjoy working on cars. Now as a full time tech, working on a car after work just feels like work I’m not being paid for.

I enjoy fiddling in my garden, until something like this happens.

That’s from a brown widow smaller than a pin head.

 

Never been bitten by one.
Hope I never do.

About the only time I swell up like that is if I get into poison ivy.
I took me about 2 trips to the doctor for a steroid shot to LEARN what it was.
When I run a string trimmer, I almost always have to dress in long pants and long sleeves.
I live in the South East Tennessee, it grows every where.

 

If you're using a decent, calibrated torque wrench, when you hear the "click", it's met the torque setting you've set it to.

That being said, there are different factors that can affect whether or not a fastener is actually at spec or remains at spec. Many of the factors are essentially negligible in practice, but one that may be causing that behavior where you get a second "click" is the fact that torquing a fastener has a non-zero effect on the rest of the components in the system. For example, as you torque subsequent fasteners, the wheel can move slightly, the mounting surface, threads, and wheel can deform slightly, the contact area between the nut and stud can shift slightly, etc. Typically these all have a small effect, but it can certainly cause the lug nuts to seem to "loosen" (or "tighten") a small amount.

At the end of the day, I would expect that for the majority of situations, a fastener moving after it's already being torqued with the "click", it's likely due to a tool that's out of calibration or damaged, or user error (which we all fall victim to every now and again).

To answer you original question, if the tool is calibrated correctly and you are using it as intended, additional "clicks" after the first won't continue to increase the torque on the fastener (unless you push it past the "click", obviously) by any measurable amount.

 

And make sure your cleaning the corrosion from the hub face/lip and the wheel center. Get a brush and clean it off, put a little grease on there too, it won't hurt. You don't want the lug nuts dragging the wheel onto that lip, that's how they loosen up

I'm also partial to a small dab of copper antisieze inside the lug nut, directly on the threads. Not too much just a little on the head of a pocket screw driver

 

Yes, sir.
I actually do place the wheel on the hub ring myself. That way I know it’s setting on the ring and not against the ring. Just to be sure, I will also spin the wheel once I have them semi-tight, and look to see if there is a gap between rotor/drum. (This isn’t alway easy to see on some wheels) But on the TRD off-road wheels, there is plenty of space between the spokes of the wheel.

 

I would say as a caveat to that: be cognisant that adding any lubrication to the threads, such as grease or anti-seize, will change the relationship between applied torque, and the actual clamping force the fastener provides and the internal stress within the fasteners themselves. For the same applied torque, a fastener with threads lubricated by grease or anti-seize will provide greater clamping force and the fasteners will experience greater internal stress compared to a non-lubricated fastener (and those differences have the potential to be significant). So just be careful that the fasteners are not over-tightened.

 

One more thing to be aware of is that movement of turning the torque wrench can effect when/ how it clicks. At my job I had a customer report that we had defective hardware because they were snapping bolt heads off about 50% of the time. So we got some samples and everything appeared normal. Then I went to site to investigate and installed a couple of systems using their tools, nothing. Had them install one in front of me and they snapped off the first bolt head.

The guys there were so paranoid about using the torque wrench that they were "hunting for torque" moving so slowly searching for that exact moment when it clicked that they bound up the wrench and it would never click. When they would use the same wrench at a normal speed, it hit correct torque every time

This was with $1,000+ torque wrenches that are calibrated every year. This happens more on low torque stuff, spark plugs, oil pan bolts etc. The bolts from my story were getting torqued to 10 ft-lbs (120 inch-lbs)

 

As others have said this depends on your tool, but something I haven't noticed in the thread so far is the question of whether you are backing off the tool between clicks.

If you click, then back off and click again, there should not be appreciable change to the fastener.

If, for example, you're using an old fashioned spring click torque wrench, it may not even click a second time without backing off.