Listers,
I've done a torque comparison of Locktite Red and Blue which hopefully will
be helpful to someone.
I'm using high strength bolts for my TR4's rod bolts and will not use the
standard lock tabs, so some kind of thread lock will be required. I've
read that Red requires lots of heat and pounds of C4 to loosen, so was
apprehensive about being able to remove the bolts.
I cleaned a couple 7/16 x 20 bolts (as close as I had to my rod bolts) and
nuts in paint thinner, wire brushed 'em, then recleaned, air dried them,
then torqued the nuts to 40 lbs-feet. The nuts came off at the nominally
same torque. I then coated four bolt threads (for full nut thread
engagement) adjacent to the bolt heads with Red and four threads with Blue
on the other bolt, then torqued the nuts to 40 lbs-feet again. Next
evening I removed the nuts. The Blue nut broke at 40 lbs-feet, while the
Red took 65 lbs-feet to break. They both required torque to completely
remove (the clean nuts spun freely after breaking free).
So the bottom line is that Red may be untorqued with a little extra umph;
it's not a permanent installation. I don't know how these results scale to
threads of other sizes. Locktite's instructions say to coat the threads on
both parts, so my results may be lower than proper application would
achieve, but this test simulates my rod situation pretty closely.
Jim
--
Jim
jhassall@blacksburg.net
Blacksburg VA
'63 TR4 in autox preparation, 90% finished, 90% to go
|