"Dean Hoffman" " wrote in message ...

The instructor at my last code refresher class talked about
properly torquing wiring connections. He said he went through a
building one time checking the connections. Few or none were torqued
properly.
I'm just curious if any of the pros here actually torque connections.
A quarter turn from breaking the screw is how people in my acquaintance
do it. Me included.

If the termination is phillips, or blade, there really is not a need since
max torque is easily achieved.

Using nuts and bolts and/or allen head, all the time. I always carried
around one of those all in one handbooks from Ace Hardware. This book
is like a little almanac for "you name it". In this book it has a listing
of torque tables for size and grade of different size bolts. Plus the
conversion formulae for converting to and from inch pounds (usually what terminals
and lugs are listed under). I also managed to get a listing of all the
inch pound torque specs for Burndy lugs (ubiquitous) and used this as a
bookmark. Look up the size of the allen head and figure out the foot pounds
of torque for the torque wrench.

Usually it is not under torquing, but over torquing that is a problem. Some
of the lug housings may be split rather easily, and when you split a hard to
get lug on a $1000.00 plus circuit breaker or motor-starter for the first time,
that little torque wrench in the tool box becomes your friend when it comes to
the final five seconds of an install turning into a couple of days waiting for
one stupid lug to be located and express shipped.

Some lugs have very short set screws. I hate them. Unless you are maxing the
barrel out, putting the proper torque will drive the set screw past the threads.
Since the thread counts and dimensions are rather universal, I kept a supply of
the most common sizes in allen type, extra long. I'd pull the short ones and
toss them in the trash. I also kept a supply of the most common types of
lugs I might encounter in a grab box, in sets of four. There are certain things
that seem stupid to keep on hand at all times, but when in need. Hell, I bought
a wire fed welder for those moments when drilling and tapping just plain sucks.
Damn, I ran out of 3/8's bolts or strut nuts. It is metal, weld the beotch.:-)