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Re: Tool for a loved one

To: Shop Talk <shop-talk@autox.team.net>
Subject: Re: Tool for a loved one
From: Chris Heerschap <Heerschap@eng.kns.com>
Date: Tue, 23 Nov 1999 15:32:01 -0500
Robert Bownes wrote:
> > > And IMO, you always have to worry about rounding the fastener or
> > > breaking the bolt.  Using a 6 point socket just tips the
> > odds towards
> > > breaking the bolt.

One thing I just thought about... if you have to worry about breaking
the bolt... then I'd rather just break it than round it and then have
to break it.

In other words, if it's so frozen that it's gonna break, doesn't much
matter if you use six or twelve points, because it's gonna break. ;)

If you use 12s and round it, then you've gotta deal with breaking it
with vice-grips.  Why not just break it properly with 6s? :)

> > I'm spoiled... the cars I work on are fairly new and breaking bolts
> > hasn't been a concern.
> 
> See, that's where my original comment about never having rounded a
> bolt/nut comes in. In  ~30 years of wrenching on things automotive, I've
> broken many a nut/bolt, rounded plenty with a open end or crescent
> wench, but never rounded one with a 12 point socket. Now there have been

Just out of curiousity, whose 12 point sockets do you use?  I'm
guessing higher quality stuff with tighter tolerances.

> a few that I couldn't get a socket to fit on because they were rusted,
> but those are oddball cases.

That's not gonna be fixed with six points, I've seen them as well. :(

> Most of what I've wrenched on has hardly been new. But, in the last few
> years, I've also taken to replacing fasteners as I go too...

That and anti-seize work together very well... if you break a bolt
you've had out before, shame, shame, shame. *heh*


cmh
-- 
Chris Heerschap - UNIX Systems Mutilator/Postmaster

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