Just realized my torque wrench drifted 12 ft-lbs over 4 years

Was doing a landing gear job in Phoenix last month and the new cal tool flagged my old wrench way off. Nobody calibrates these things unless QA forces it, has anyone else found their daily driver is way out of spec?

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gavinp447d ago

You ever drop a wrench on a concrete hangar floor one too many times and wonder if it's still right? I had a digital torque adapter read 8 ft-lbs low on a 50 ft-lbs setting after two years of light use, and that was with me treating it like it was made of glass. The cheap beam-style wrenches hold up better in my experience, but the click types get lazy in the spring. My rule now is to check them against a known-good torque wrench every spring, especially before anything on a rotorhead or brake caliper. A 12 ft-lbs drift on a landing gear bolt is a hard no, that's how you get a walk-around inspection turning into a hangar queen.