Buying 85 IDI ATS turbo motorhome!

YJMike92

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There is a good chance the calipers installed at the shop are a lifetime warranty as well.
As a shop owner, I have contacted a shop that did work previously for a customer and was able to get the parts warrantied. You would need to talk to the original shop, ask them where the parts came from, and ask them to arrange the swap through your local store. It's worth a shot.
 

Cubey

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There is a good chance the calipers installed at the shop are a lifetime warranty as well.
As a shop owner, I have contacted a shop that did work previously for a customer and was able to get the parts warrantied. You would need to talk to the original shop, ask them where the parts came from, and ask them to arrange the swap through your local store. It's worth a shot.

Yeah, it's worth a try. I'll call Monday. Thanks for the suggestion. The bad caliper does have a QR code type of sticker still on it so maybe that can be used to track it somehow.
 

Booyah45828

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And you might be surprised to find that some shops are a member of a network of shops that offer warranty work and replacement in other areas. For instance, we're a napa auto care center, so most things I do come with a 2 year/ 24k miles warranty that is honored at every napa auto care center. So if I replace an alternator for one of my customers and it has a failure on vacation. They only need to find an auto care center and the new shop will perform the work and should then submit the invoice to corporate, costing the customer little to nothing.
 

Cubey

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And you might be surprised to find that some shops are a member of a network of shops that offer warranty work and replacement in other areas. For instance, we're a napa auto care center, so most things I do come with a 2 year/ 24k miles warranty that is honored at every napa auto care center. So if I replace an alternator for one of my customers and it has a failure on vacation. They only need to find an auto care center and the new shop will perform the work and should then submit the invoice to corporate, costing the customer little to nothing.

The one I used is an indie shop as far as I know. It's not a Napa auto care center, for example. I was in a pinch and had to find a very close by shop where I was, with a tall enough garage bay door to be able to pull in the RV, and they were a good fit. And the problem with that is that I already pulled off one caliper since I was doing the rotors anyway. I'd rather just do it myself at this point so I know it's done right. I always get burned by having brake work done in shops (except by one shop on a beater Buick years ago) because they steal parts I bring in, or they tear stuff up, or they leave stuff off, etc.
 

Cubey

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Getting the rotors/hubs put back.

The manual says to torque the spindle nut to around 20ft lbs then back off 1/2 turn, but heck I can't ever get there. It keeps wanting to tighten down more. The torque wrench never clicks to show it's at 20ft lbs. The bearings never lock up, I can always turn the hub by hand. It does get harder. A neighbor says tighten until you can't turn it, back it off 1/2 turn and you are good. Well... I can't do either one. It gets to the point that the socket just wants to slip off due to having to use a deep socket and a short extension to reach the nut in the hub.

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Cubey

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CRAP!!!! :frustrate

The (used) spindle nuts stripped out! It's stuck on the spindle on the LH side! Neighbor said he might have to cold chisel the nut to split it to get it off. :(

He's busy for the rest of today, so maybe tomorrow he can help some more.

The RH side nut came back off, but it did strip too. The freaking washer on the RH side is stuck too, can't even get it apart by hand. Might have to use a puller or side hammer to get that back off now. It came apart by hand before.

I was only using a torque wrench set to 20 ft-lbs for crying out loud!

I ordered 2 new spindle nut sets (cotter pin and all) from O'Reilly, available Tuesday. I hope the spindles didn't get ruined. There are a matching set on ebay for $150 for both sides from an old RV being parted out, so at least that is an option if we find the spindles stripped. Assuming a local salvage yard doesn't have any for any less money.

EDIT: I ordered a 3/4-16 rethreading die from crapazon (delivery Tuesday) in case I need to chase the threads on the spindle. If I don't use it, it can go back.

Maybe I'll get out of here before the new year....

Edit 2: at least I'm not the only person that happened to. It did on this person's RV too: https://www.ford-trucks.com/forums/1382468-help-stripped-stuck-front-hub-spindle-nut.html
 
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IDIBRONCO

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I was only using a torque wrench set to 20 ft-lbs for crying out loud!
Here's something to check. Torque wrenches can go bad without warning. The only time I was building a 7.3 PSD, mine went bad as I was torquing the head bolts down. I think the spec is 100 or 105 lb-ft. I torqued one down and the next one wouldn't torque within the same amount of travel that the rest had. I backed them all of and borrowed another torque wrench to finish the engine up. I bought another one and I still have it today, probably 19 or 20 years later. Try checking yours against another one.
 

Cubey

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Here's something to check. Torque wrenches can go bad without warning. The only time I was building a 7.3 PSD, mine went bad as I was torquing the head bolts down. I think the spec is 100 or 105 lb-ft. I torqued one down and the next one wouldn't torque within the same amount of travel that the rest had. I backed them all of and borrowed another torque wrench to finish the engine up. I bought another one and I still have it today, probably 19 or 20 years later. Try checking yours against another one.

Well the thing is, normally you more or less tighten until the bearings cant move, then back it off. I was tightening a bit, stopping to turn the hub several rotations in both directions, then repeat. But maybe the initial tightening I did was enough to strip them. Neither side ever got so tight that they couldn't move. Maybe the nuts were already weak and just couldn't take being torqued again?

It's a HFT torque wrench but it has served me well many years and never had a problem. I have followed the instructions to always set back to the lowest value when stored so it doesn't stretch out the internals. But maybe it's worn out now after using it for 145ft lbs lug nuts (9/16" swivels) so much recently. I do have a 3/8" one also but I'll have to find/get an adapter to use that with the 27mm 1/2" drive deep impact socket.

I won't use the 1/2" one anymore except for lug nuts and/or general socket wrench use.

What gets me is how small of a spindle/nut (3/4") they use for 1 ton chassis front ends. That just seems so small to me, compared to the rear axle.
 

The_Josh_Bear

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I agree that it sounds like the torque wrench is incorrect. It's only 20 ft-lbs for Pete's sake you shouldn't be able to strip anything so large with such little torque.

That's only 20 lbs on the end of a 1ft lever. Or 10 lbs on a 2ft lever. I've used this method for a pinion nut at 250ftlbs by using a 50lb bag on the end of a 5ft pipe over my breaker bar. 5x50=250ft-lbs.

Another tip I've heard for torque wrenches is to "warm them up" on very low torques before you get to critical stuff. This is to get the oil inside moved around a bit before the final value. But obviously that's not the problem on a 1/2" torque wrench, can't have much range under 20...
 

IDIBRONCO

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I've also been told that if you use them for higher torque settings, it will throw off the lower ones. So maybe the 140 setting has thrown off the 20 setting?
 

Cubey

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Yeah figures, that crappy shop uses a more localized, regional auto parts store, so customers are S.O.L. if you don't live around there. The shop has no intention of helping with the issue either. The calipers they bought are only 2 year warranty too. Still under warranty but that doesn't help me at all. The nearest store in that small chain of auto parts stores is 80 miles away. If I still had insurance on my pickup, it would cost a little less to drive there to swap them out assuming they'd even let me being a third party owner of the part and not the shop who bought them. My mom's car is old (03 Taurus) and she's crazy protective of it (despite denting it up hitting stuff with it over the years..) so asking to drive that far with it is out of the question. She gets fussy if I need to drive it 4 miles round trip to O'Reilly. So yeah, I'm just screwed and have to buy them again.
 
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YJMike92

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Yeah figures, that crappy shop uses a more localized, regional auto parts store, so customers are S.O.L. if you don't live around there. The shop has no intention of helping with the issue either. The calipers they bought are only 2 year warranty too. Still under warranty but that doesn't help me at all. The nearest store in that small chain of auto parts stores is 80 miles away. If I still had insurance on my pickup, it would cost a little less to drive there to swap them out assuming they'd even let me being a third party owner of the part and not the shop who bought them. My mom's car is old (03 Taurus) and she's crazy protective of it (despite denting it up hitting stuff with it over the years..) so asking to drive that far with it is out of the question. She gets fussy if I need to drive it 4 miles round trip to O'Reilly. So yeah, I'm just screwed and have to buy them again.

Well, it was worth a try. They could have been a little more helpful than it sounds like they are.
 

Cubey

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Well, it was worth a try. They could have been a little more helpful than it sounds like they are.

Yeah. I'm more worried about the spindles now after the nuts stripped and one nut is stuck on there. Well, at most it might cost me another $150 to buy the early 80s RV ones on ebay and have to swap them out. Well, plus ball joints since it would be dumb not to get new ones if the steering knuckles have to be replaced.

EDIT: Oh, these don't have ball joints. Just king pins. At least they cost less and don't take special tools to replace, if it comes to that. Diagram here: https://www.bluespringsfordparts.co...e--xl--5-8l-v8-gas/front-suspension--king-pin

The rethreading die is already out for delivery today. I have to wait for a dry day to get out and work on getting the stuck on RH hub/washer (nut removed) and the LH nut removed (stuck on the spindle freely spinning). In the meantime both sides have tarps over the rotors/hubs/spindles to keep out the rain.

If not for the fact that the motorhome literally can't be moved now since it has no way to attach front wheels, I'd have considered leaving it here until next year and go traveling in the truck camper again for a while, even if there's no solar panel on it anymore. But I can't really leave the motorhome sitting on jack stands for a year in the driveway like it is now. So, by the time I get the motorhome's hubs/spindles and front brakes fixed so that it can be moved, then it should be good to drive again so I wouldn't need to drive the truck.

I can see why people like to pay shops since this is a big ball of stress when something goes wrong. If I had the money, I would have done that.
 
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Scotty4

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I've also been told that if you use them for higher torque settings, it will throw off the lower ones. So maybe the 140 setting has thrown off the 20 setting?
To extend torque wrench life, the navy only allows you to use a wrench between 20-90% of its range and to test 6 times on a stationary socket (welded on a beam). They also get calibrated each year but, who does that?
 

Booyah45828

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If you're not using a torque wrench frequently, a beam type torque wrench is usually cheap and accurate enough. IDK how you stripped the nuts/spindles, and you definitely don't need to tighten until it stops spinning. You simply want to tighten to spec while spinning to squeeze the grease out. Then loosen half a turn and retighten to get the correct end play, the end play spec should be online, but .001-.005 is about what you want.
 

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