when fitting the wishbones and shockers do you need to use high tensile bolts(10.9)or are (8.8)o.k.and are the ball joints o.k. connected to the arms with 8.8

Hi,
8.8 Ton bolts ARE high tensile, 10.9 are just higher still. Non high tensile can be anything from 4.8 ton upwards and will vary as they are ungraded.

Assuming that they are M10 or larger, 8.8 Ton bolts are fine for bolting your wishbones onto the chassis and at each end of your shock absorbers but I would tend to use 10.9 or even 12.9 ton bolts for the balljoint to wishbone fasteners as these are quite highly stressed and the consequences of failure are pretty high. If your shock absorbers use 1/2" diameter bolts then the grade you need is also known as 'S' grade which is just another name for 8.8 ton.

Even Lolocost supply 10.9 ton bolts for the smaller bolts on the ends of the balljoint although they only supply 8.8 ton for the big M12 (or whatever they are). I think that this is the minimum that you would want and anything more than this should be considered a further safety margin and is probably worthwhile for peace of mind.

I hope this helps.
Cheers,
Craig.

Hi again,
I should also mention that as with most fasteners you will need to tighten them to the appropriate torque and this is dependent on the size and grade of the bolt as well as the application. This is outside my area of expertise so I'll let some of the other guys step in here. This has been answered before though so a search of the forum might be useful.

Cheers,
Craig.

cortina joints hold on with (i think) 2 8mm bolts and two 12mm bolts at the end of the big tab.

IIRC, astra / maxi / whatever seem to use two bolts (10mm or so?)

The cortina one seems pretty well bolted down to me!

its the 10mm bolts thro the shocks that seem to take the load.......


atb

steve

Ive got a chart for torque settings if you want it, give me a shout and Ill Email it to you.

Gordon

mk if you could mail me the chart that would be great ,no imediate rush though,im still only trial fitting everything.thanx

MK,
Any chance of a copy of that torque chart too please? Email to:
locostbuilder@craig.chamberlain.name

Thanks!

Gordon, I would like the chart if you could send it

Thanks
Mark

I think Ive sent it to all as requested, if you havent got my Email let me know.

Gordon

Er, I'm a bit late, but could you send it to me please also?

Cheers

All recieved, thanks Gordon

Mark

Any chance it could be posted in the photo archives? If not could you send me a copy please.

Cheers.

GO,
It was a word document but I've extracted the image which should appear below. I hope you don't mind Gordon?



Cheers,
Craig.

Hi GO

Ive sent the chart to you on Email.

I tried to put it in the photo archive but it said it was the wrong format ( its a word doc).

Ill send ChrisW an Email to see if theres an easy way of converting it.

Oops you beat me to it THANKS
Gordon

[Edited on 3:1:04 by Mk-Ninja]

Thats great, cheers guys.

That's the oddest chart I've ever seen. It mixes metric and imperial nomenclature, and the values seem low. What's the source if you don't mind my asking?

Hi Rorty

It was compiled by one of the fastener manufactures for a large engineering company I used to work for. I must admit that I have never recalculated the figures but it was used for many years without problems.

Gordon

Are cap head bolts always 12.9 then?

Kingr

I have only ever seen and used HT Capheads, that is not to say that you cant get lower spec bolts in capheads form.

Like I said above the chart was put together for the company I worked for and they only used HT capheads, if you find yourself with a 8.8 Caphead then use the 8.8 column.

It was used as a general guide, we gave specific torque figures for aplications where the figures on the chart would be inappropriate, and I can only say that the figures never caused concern.

It would be good if anybody else has figures to either support or update the ones I have.

Gordon

Ive just got hold of an Unbrako caphead bolt catalogue and all the figures are the same as the chart above so that gives me confidence that the others will be OK as well, but I will try and get those figures confirmed.

Gordon