[PNWStrom]

Gentlemens,

Someone was good enough (greywolf?) to post a chart of all torque values for a DL650. I thought I had saved it, apparently I didn't. Searching for "torque values" pulls up a "haystack" of related stuff and I cannot find the "needle", the chart of all torque values.

Would anyone be able to post the chart again? Many thanks.

18,500+ miles and counting on my 09. Changed the front brake pads today for the first time. It was time.

 

[greywolf]

How much torque should I use on the bolts?
Read the warning too. I also prefer 58lb-ft with anti seize for the rear axle nut, no more than 36lb-ft for the rear sprocket nuts and 83lb-ft for the DL650 front sprocket nut, just like the exact same nut on the DL1000.

 

[PNWStrom]

Thank you Sir. Hopefully others find it helpful as well. Thanks for taking the time.

 

[greywolf]

Thank you Sir. Hopefully others find it helpful as well. Thanks for taking the time.

Thank John Weldon for posting the charts in the first place. I know he gets frustrated at all the torque questions at VSRI even though he put the charts in the FAQ.

 

[HolyStromboli]

Thank you Sir. Hopefully others find it helpful as well. Thanks for taking the time.

This is a most helpful chart as I've been wrenching on my new (to me) Wee for the last four days and I need to know this info. This is getting printed out and taped right on the tool box.

Greywolf or anyone else - pardon the noob question but is anti-seize the same as Loctite blue?

Also, does the front axle and/or the two bolts that hold on each front brake caliber need Loctite? If so, I assume it's the blue and not red.

 

[greywolf]

Anti seize is a lubricant to prevent galling or corroding together while Loctite is a thread locker to prevent movement. The rear axle nut is either castellated or self locking to prevent movement so anti seize is all that is needed to keep the nut from marrying the axle and it doesn't need to be cleaned up. Loctite blue will also coat and prevent seizing if it is applied to all the threads in contact but requires unnecessary muscle to break loose and leaves crud behind. Blue Loctite is often recommended for the caliper bolts. The front axle doesn't need anything. I've never heard of it coming loose as the pinch bolt on the right fork leg keeps it from turning.

 

[HolyStromboli]

Anti seize is a lubricant to prevent galling or corroding together while Loctite is a thread locker to prevent movement. The rear axle nut is either castellated or self locking to prevent movement so anti seize is all that is needed to keep the nut from marrying the axle and it doesn't need to be cleaned up. Loctite blue will also coat and prevent seizing if it is applied to all the threads in contact but requires unnecessary muscle to break loose and leaves crud behind. Blue Loctite is often recommended for the caliper bolts. The front axle doesn't need anything. I've never heard of it coming loose as the pinch bolt on the right fork leg keeps it from turning.

Thank you, sir. Very helpful as usual. :cheers2:

 

[Jimm]

Fork Clamp Bolt Torques

I'm trying uncuccessfully to find the specific thread, but I think this is close enough.

The factory torque value for the upper and lower fork clamp bolts is 16.5 ft-lbs. Greywolf (if you're reading this), why do you recommend a torque less than this?

I would have thought that 16.5 was low, and every time I hit a pothole or a rock, this thought comes back to me!

On my Vee I used hear a zipping sound as I slid the fork legs up and down indicating to me that there was a microscopic spline or ribs on the clamp and fork. I don't hear this on my wee.

 

[griffin800]

torque

Have to remember that on a motorcycle lots of these steel bolts thread into aluminum. Specially on small diameter bolts it doesn't take a heck of alot of torque to just pull the threads right out of the aluminum. Bad thing, don't wanna do that. On some parts it's possible to repair with a threaded insert on many more it's a part replacement to fix, gets expensive very quickly. Do yourself a huge favor and follow the recommended torque specs.

Bill H.

 

[greywolf]

The factory torque value for the upper and lower fork clamp bolts is 16.5 ft-lbs. Greywolf (if you're reading this), why do you recommend a torque less than this?

I think 16.5lb-ft is okay for the fork clamp bolts. It used to worry me a bit because of the amount of aluminum but it apparently works fine. When I put a torque wrench on them, it tightened the bolts more than I had done by hand. I've done fork clamp bolts without a torque wrench for decades and never had one move even though I apparently use a lower value.

 

[Sprocket]

Torque Spreadsheet

I made a spreadsheet to use as a checklist when torquing fasteners on the bike. I think it's pretty self-explanatory (see the notes).

Its main virtue for me is that it sorts the fasteners by torque. This way, I can easily identify all the fasteners that need a particular torque setting and do all of them in sequence so I don't have to reset the torque wrench so often.

You'll notice that the lb-in values are bold in the first part of the table and the lb-ft values in the latter half. That's just a guide I use to indicate whether to use my lb-in wrench or my lb-ft wrench. Depending on the range of your wrenches, you may switch over at a different point.

I hope this is helpful.

 

[greywolf]

Nice. But #20 is a misprint in the manual. Instead of 25.5lb-ft, it should be 16.5lb-ft. Good job on marking down the rear sprocket nut on #23 to 30lb-ft as per Rich Desmond's suggestion. The manual's 43.5lb-ft is out of sight and I wouldn't go any higher than 36lb-ft. I'd add a note on #30. The 58lb-ft listed there is in agreement with my suggestion but it would be good to add the use of anti seize to the note. 58lb-ft would be a little light, through probably adequate, dry.

One more note because it has been mixed up before. The size values in the table are for the wrench that fits the bolts in question. Bolts are sized by the shank diameter though. For example, the fork bolts #10 and #11 have 10mm heads but are 8mm bolts because they have 8mm shanks. Most 8mm bolts have 12mm heads such as #12 and #13.

 

[Sprocket]

Thanks for the feedback, Pat.

I was not aware of the error in the published torque for the bolts that connect the cowling brace to the frame head. Now that you point it out, I recognize that this is similar to the error in the manual (page 3-11) where the 8 mm bolts connecting the engine support bracket to the frame are erroneously labeled as requiring 25.5 lb-ft but should be 16.5 lb-ft. I've corrected the spreadsheet and added the note you recommended about using anti-seize on the rear axle nut.

As for your other note about "size" referring to bolt head vs. shank diameter. You're right, of course, that fastener size normally refers to the shank diameter. To prevent confusion, I've relabeled that column. It's now "Head" instead of "Size". The purpose of that column is to indicate the socket that is needed for the fastener. The purpose of the spreadsheet is to streamline the process of torquing fasteners, so I sorted it first by specified torque and second by fastener head dimension. This lets you dial in a torque value, cover all the fasteners requiring that torque having the same head dimension; then without changing the torque setting of the wrench, switch to a different socket and check all the fasteners requiring the same torque but having a different size head. This really only comes into play in rows 10-18 where fasteners with three different head sizes all require the same torque value.

 

[greywolf]

Uh Oh! The engine support bracket to frame was the error I was talking about. The cowling bracket to frame bolts are 10mm so 25.5lb-ft is correct. Sorry about that. I hadn't realized you already caught that. That's very handy chart and saves a lot of hard drive space between the ears. Good work.

 

[Sprocket]

Fixed it. (Reverted back to 25.5 lb-ft for the bolts at the cowling brace.) I remember torquing those to 25.5 lb-ft and nothing bad happened, so that's probably the right number.

I removed the note about using threadlocker on those bolts. I've seen reports of them coming loose, so threadlocker is probably appropriate. However, I don't know how the use of threadlocker changes the appropriate torque to use, so I'll leave that decision to someone else.

Also, it's my understanding that fasteners that have been treated with loctite shouldn't be torqued after the loctite has cured. Is that right, Pat?

I'm finding that the zip file containing the spreadsheet won't open when I retrieve it from the site with Internet Explorer, but it works fine when retrieved with Firefox. Not sure what's up with that. I've tried three different Zip utilities, and the behavior is the same with all of them. [Edit: I found (via Googling) that if I turn off "Use HTTP 1.1" in the Advanced IE settings, the downloaded zip file will work properly. I don't know what collateral impact turning off HTTP 1.1 might have, so I'm not turning it off permanently. Anyway, if you're having problems getting downloaded zip files to open, you might want to try that.]

 

[greywolf]

Once Loctite is cured, moving he bolt will break the bond. Having a liquid on the threads may act as a bit of a lubricant, but thread locker isn't a very good lubricant so I wouldn't worry about it.

 

[guywithchickens]

I think 16.5lb-ft is okay for the fork clamp bolts. It used to worry me a bit because of the amount of aluminum but it apparently works fine. When I put a torque wrench on them, it tightened the bolts more than I had done by hand. I've done fork clamp bolts without a torque wrench for decades and never had one move even though I apparently use a lower value.

I know this is an old thread, but I just wanted to say thanks to Greywolf. As a relatively new Wee owner (~6 months), I've used a ton of his advice from here and advrider. Super helpful! :thumbup: