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Problems getting shackle bolts to seat properly


Overland

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I'm doing some suspension mods which involves new shackles and the specs say to torque them to 30-50 lb ft. But that level of torque wouldn't pull the bolts tight.  I went ahead and cranked down on them and got them to seat, at least I thought, but when lubing them, I get grease coming out between the bolt and nut heads and the shackles.  

So now I'm worried the nuts are going to back off while traveling.  Any suggestions on how to deal with this?  Or is it normal - I'm guessing that everything is tight against the bushings if not the shackles, but who knows?

Edited by Overland
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How about a great big dead blow hammer and a great big brass drift? Whack the bolt head really hard a few time, check to see if the nut torque dropped, retorqued the nut, repeat until they no longer shift. Like bearing races, at some point they will quit moving and bottom out. Did you install new nuts? They are self locking and should not back out by themselves. OTH old nuts possibly could.

If you are really worried, just double nut each bolt with a free running jam nut, which will prevent the “primary” nut from moving.

Good luck.

John Davies

Spokane WA

Edited by John E Davies
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I can't really knock them in since I installed them backwards to make it easier to inspect the nuts.  There's just enough room behind to attach the grease gun without too much difficulty, but no room to swing a hammer.  

The new nuts have a flange but they're not serrated or anything.  I may see about getting some jam nuts, that sounds like a good idea.  Thanks.

Edited by Overland
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17 minutes ago, Overland said:

The new nuts have a flange but they're not serrated or anything

The correct flange nuts are prevailing torque locking. Single use is the best practice but I always use a medium thread locker as an additional safeguard even when nuts are new.

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