I bought a new Cervelo P2 triathlon bike and didn’t want to break the carbon, so I bought a torque wrench. Actually, I already had a torque wrench that I bought from Sears for about $20. It’s a beam type wrench, and I didn’t feel it was accurate enough to use with the carbon fiber bike.
This new torque wrench from Pedro’s is what I bought on rei.com, and I paid $150 for it. As I later found out, a simple google search would have saved me about $50.
The wrench is small, which is good. When you are torquing some of those bicycle bolts, there isn’t always room for a long beam-type torque wrench. Can I just say how much I hate typing “torque wrench”? Pedro’s wrench (or just PTW) has a dial of sorts. You pull the bottom away from the wrench, and then turn it until the desired torque value appears in the window, then put the bottom back up. It’s actually spring loaded, so the pushing/pulling is easy. Using the wrench is easy too. As you tighten the bolt, the wrench clicks and slips when you get to the desired torque value.
Here’s the part that really screwed me up: PTW has a 1/4 inch drive. All my sockets are 3/8 inch drive. So now I have a really expensive TW, and no sockets that work with it. Another google.com search revealed that Pedro also sells sockets for their wrench. For some reason, rei.com didn’t tell me that I should have also bought those. But, I had all these nice hex sockets, why should I have to buy new ones? The solution: 1/4 inch to 3/8 inch socket adapter bought at Autozone for about $5. Just go down to your local store and get it, you’ll never find it online. BTW, Autozone has a lot of good tools.
Bottom line: If you have a carbon fiber bike, you’re going to need a torque wrench like Pedro’s. Don’t buy it at rei.com. And if you already have 3/8 inch drive sockets, go to Autozone for an adapter.
I live in Orlando, Florida and participate in marathons and triathlons.
