Torquing the plunger knife nuts

The proper way: buy a torque wrench that can be fitted with different insertable tools, such as a Stahlwille 730, and an open end insert tool.

The bush mechanic way: guess the torque on all of them.

The compromise: use your existing torque wrench on the two lower bolts, then feel how tight they are with a normal wrench and tighten the top bolt with the normal wrench until it feels about the same tightness.

Roger

The only bolt I would worry about is the top bolt and nut in the photo. If you cannot get a box end wrench on the top nut, you need to grind some of the material away from the horizontal plate next to the nut. Early models did not have enough space between that plate and nut to get a box end wrench onto the nut. Even the newer balers are a tight fit.

Use a "crows foot", an opened attachment for the torque wrench?

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In 23 years of servicing our big square baler, I have never used a torque wrench on the plunger knife shear bolts. There isn’t room to get a socket on them. Crowfoot can only take a limited amount of torque being open end, plus the torque number needs to be refigured given the offset of a crowfoot. Never has one come loose. Learn how to use a double wrenching procedure using the next larger wrench size than what fits the fastener, and with modest effort you can get it tight enough with the box end of a wrench.

Gearclash said:

Example of double wrenching. Purists will howl that it is abusing the tools; if you have quality tools they will take it no problem. View attachment 93118

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Once I was taught that I have used it all the time.

Gearclash said:

Learn how to use a double wrenching procedure using the next larger wrench size than what fits the fastener, and with modest effort you can get it tight enough with the box end of a wrench.

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Is there any risk of cracking the blade?

Rrueda said:

Is there any risk of cracking the blade?

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Not any more than if a torque wrench were used. The main risk of cracking a blade comes from improper shimming under the blade.

Torque values on old reused bolts a crap shoot anyways.

slowzuki said:

Torque values on old reused bolts a crap shoot anyways.

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Truth. On top of that, using a torque wrench to determine the axial tension applied to a fastener is not a dramatic amount more accurate than guessing! This per Machinery’s Handbook, 27th edition.

Yup did bolt clamping design in school, even high tolerance bolts, lubricated etc, very tough. The long bolts and stretch bolts had a better chance of hitting a target value at least.