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A journeyman in Toledo told me to torque every lug twice, and I still can't decide if he was right
He said aluminum feeders loosen up after the first pass, so he hits them again before closing the panel, and I've seen maybe 3 loose neutrals since I started doing it his way. Half the guys I work with say a calibrated click is a calibrated click and a second pass is just theater. Any of you actually seen a re-torque catch something on a copper run?
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ruby_bell479h ago
Check the actual wording on aluminum terminations before you trust that click twice thing, because the second pass is not really about the same torque value. Aluminum does cold flow under compression, so a lot of manufacturers tell you to torque it, let it sit, then come back and hit it again at the SAME spec, not a lighter one. On copper runs I have caught a loose lug on a second pass maybe twice in years, and both times it was a stranded conductor that settled into the lug, not the metal relaxing. So the journeyman was not wrong, he just had the reason sort of backwards for copper. Do it on aluminum every time because the spec says so, and on copper it is cheap insurance but do not act like it is finding problems every panel. The guys saying a click is a click are right about the wrench and wrong about the metal moving after the click.
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robin8969h ago
Why does this same thing show up everywhere, where people learn a rule but not the reason behind it and then pass it down like it's gospel? @ruby_bell47 nailed the part that matters, which is that the second pass on aluminum is about the spec and the metal creeping, not some magic trick that finds loose lugs on every panel. I see this pattern all over, someone hears half an explanation from a guy who heard it from another guy, and next thing you know it's treated as a law of nature. Same as people who think you have to change your oil every 3,000 miles because grandpa said so, when the manual in the glovebox says something totally different. The fix is boring but simple, read what the maker actually wrote for the metal you're working with and stop repeating stuff you never checked.
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