Torque Wrench Recommendations

[flwatersaver]

Why waste the money.. I use a simple beam style torque wrench. It may not work for tight places, but they work. Its not like your doing NASA type things.

[matt14]

First off, torque wrenches are warrentied for only a year with almost all manufacturs. If you drop it, its on you. Digital style wrenches work very well. I have both a click type and a digital ( digital hit me for 550) form mac tools. The convienance of the digital is that you can switch from foot pounds, inch pounds, newton meters, and torque angle as well. Also if you drop the torque wrench, they would be sending it out for repairs and not rebuilding it there at the truck. They would need to send it out to have re-calibrated. For the OP, I would go with the Craftsman torque wrench since you would be doing minor repairs at home. One thing with losing the " calibration ", is people do not turn the handle down and leave the desired torque of the wrench to say 90 ft.lbs until they use it again, which in your case could be months. This is what causes them to become in-accurate.

[98GCLimited]

Agreed on not putting the torque wrench away with the torque turned up on it.

Cheapest torque wrench I would get is a Craftsman, they do no warranty torque wrenches just so you know.

I have a 1/2" drive Craftsman click type and a 1/4" drive Snap-On click type for in-lbs.

[79 cutty]

First off, torque wrenches are warrentied for only a year with almost all manufacturs. If you drop it, its on you. Digital style wrenches work very well. I have both a click type and a digital ( digital hit me for 550) form mac tools. The convienance of the digital is that you can switch from foot pounds, inch pounds, newton meters, and torque angle as well. Also if you drop the torque wrench, they would be sending it out for repairs and not rebuilding it there at the truck. They would need to send it out to have re-calibrated. For the OP, I would go with the Craftsman torque wrench since you would be doing minor repairs at home. One thing with losing the " calibration ", is people do not turn the handle down and leave the desired torque of the wrench to say 90 ft.lbs until they use it again, which in your case could be months. This is what causes them to become in-accurate.

I have had my Craftsmen "click" style torque for well over 10 yrs and they have replaced it no questions asked on a couple occasions. Once they replaced it when I busted the handle because I got pissed and threw it against the wall like a young dip-shit! No problems, and no questions!

[ric006]

Snap on

[98GCLimited]

I have had my Craftsmen "click" style torque for well over 10 yrs and they have replaced it no questions asked on a couple occasions. Once they replaced it when I busted the handle because I got pissed and threw it against the wall like a young dip-shit! No problems, and no questions!

Hmm, the local Sears litterely REFUSED to replace my 1st Craftsman 1/2" drive torque wrench. I bought another one anyway because I needed it ASAP. No problems with the new one.

[matt14]

First off, torque wrenches are warrentied for only a year with almost all manufacturs. If you drop it, its on you. Digital style wrenches work very well. I have both a click type and a digital ( digital hit me for 550) form mac tools. The convienance of the digital is that you can switch from foot pounds, inch pounds, newton meters, and torque angle as well. Also if you drop the torque wrench, they would be sending it out for repairs and not rebuilding it there at the truck. They would need to send it out to have re-calibrated. For the OP, I would go with the Craftsman torque wrench since you would be doing minor repairs at home. One thing with losing the " calibration ", is people do not turn the handle down and leave the desired torque of the wrench to say 90 ft.lbs until they use it again, which in your case could be months. This is what causes them to become in-accurate.

I have had my Craftsmen "click" style torque for well over 10 yrs and they have replaced it no questions asked on a couple occasions. Once they replaced it when I busted the handle because I got pissed and threw it against the wall like a young dip-shit! No problems, and no questions!

Read this link from craftsman about there Warrenty on torque wrenches.

http://www.craftsman.com/cswarranty/nb-100000000227082#point2

[Rell]

Precision Instruments

http://www.tooltopia.com/precision-instruments-c2fr100f.aspx

Google it, or search it up on garage journal forums. Lots of info on them and reviews.

I love mine, you also don't have to set the torque down after use with these, you can leave it at whatever setting. However I reset it after use anyways because its a habit.

I also believe they use to or still do make some for snap-on. CDI torque wrenches too.

I have a craftsman 1/2" and don't really care for it, after setting torque and locking it sometimes it unlocks and the torque setting will adjust while working on something. Then I have to back off, reset and carefully torque everything down.

Dial type torque wrenches are pretty accurate too along with beam type.

Remember to implement the 20% rule also.

Example this wrench. Listed as 25-250 In Lbs lbs
http://www.sears.com/craftsman-micro-clicker-torque-wrench-3-8inch-drive/p-00931423000P?prdNo=2&blockNo=2&blockType=G2

So .20x250= 50

So wrench is really only accurate from 50in lbs to 250in lbs.

25-50 are useless settings.

Some companies account for this so don't worry about it.