Hooke's Law Revisited
In 1660, English scientist Robert Hooke created Hooke's Law. Hooke realized that object deformation, even small deformations or directly proportional to the force or load causing the deformation. In other words, the deformation of steel is linear.
Because the deformation of steel is linear, and because steel has a memory, the physical characteristics of steel were perfect to be the basis of a beam wrench. Steel memory makes the beam want to return to the original shape.
Walter P. Chrysler was watching his assembly line workers torque heads onto the aluminum blocks. It was 1924.
To fully understand the genius of Walter P. Chrysler, consider the facts. In 1924, aluminum was still relatively new. It wasn't really fully extracted and processed until 1886. Aluminum engine blocks are common today. But back in 1924, aluminum was cutting-edge technology and was used for racing engines.
The problem was that the engines were blowing up. Despite being a phenomenal engineer, Chrysler couldn't diagnose the root cause until he watched two workers tightening the head bolts. One worker was a big, strapping fellow while the other one was small in stature. Each worker did their best to tighten the bolts to their definition of tight. Their size and ability to use leverage made their definitions dramatically different. Chrysler remembered Hooke's Law and used it to develop a wrench that would measure how tight a bolt was being torqued. It was the flat beam torque wrench.
That was the start of the torque tool and error-proofing industry. Chrysler wanted to build cars, not tools. He licensed Paul Sturtevant to manufacture and sell the torque wrench. The rest, as they say, is history.
Today, engineers apply Hooke's Law, but use the deformation and memory factor with fasteners. Hooke's Law, combined with torque and angle strategies, has transformed assembly design and quality.
The advancement of torque and angle tools has made that the transition to understanding the yield curve of bolts much more accessible. Sturtevant Richmont offers an assortment of torque and angle tools to help engineers in that pursuit.
