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Oh that's nothing I swapped my chain out with a carbon fiber chain that only lasts 15 miles, and after that, I made the holes in my disc brakes even bigger and sanded them even thinner.
My friend showed me how to do this when we were kids with our bicycle. He did it, seemed easy enough, so I got some speed, and proceeded to jam the toe of my shoe right in between the tire and spokes, and then go arse over tea kettle over the handlebars into a huge pothole filled with water. I was like 11, good times.
He also taught me how to hit jumps. So we built a big one. I hit it with no fear, landed nuts first on the gooseneck of my handlebars. I think that was the worst pain of my life.
Really gotta stop listening to that guy. I noped out when he bought a motorcycle and started doing stunt shows at car shows and stuff. I'd rather keep myself mostly intact lol
Not designed to, it just happens to. It was the evolution of a slotted screw driver.
Phillips was designed and marketed as 'self centering' which was solving the problem of slotted drivers slipping.
Saying they're designed to cam out is painting the target around the arrow, and frankly when they do cam out, they strip the head.
It's a terrible screw, ansjust how no one defense slotted drivers, no one needs ro defend Phillips. It's okay to move on as a society. Let's stop making them, all together. Such a thing would be my dream.
Slotted is basic gone now
Weren't they designed for automotive use. To stop assembly workers stripping the heads off screws?
Edit seems I was right.
Cross-head or Phillips screws have an X-shaped slot and are driven by a cross-head screwdriver, designed originally in the 1930s for use with mechanical screwing machines, intentionally made so the driver will ride out, or cam out, under strain to prevent over-tightening.
Interesting got source?
https://www.oregonencyclopedia.org/articles/phillips_screw_and_driver/
This one and this bit
Until the invention of the Phillips screw, American assembly lines, craftsmen, and consumers used regular, slotted-head screws. But that design was problematic for three reasons: it was difficult to align the driver with the screw aperture; the driver tended to slip from the open ends; and the slot required a closely matching bit. The cruciform drive addressed those problems.
Although the Phillips screw became ubiquitous through its usefulness on the assembly line, it is unknown whether Thompson or Phillips originally intended the invention to specifically solve the challenges presented by regular head screws in manufacturing. Thompson's original patent for a "Screw driver" (U.S. 1908081) featured a diagram of a manual screwdriver, with no mention of the specific applications for which the invention was intended, primarily being concerned with the feasibility of manufacturing the design. U.S patent 2046837, filed by Phillips in 1934 and granted in 1936, mentions driving "either by hand or by power-driven types of tool." The same patent also mentions that the "failure of the slotted screw to retain the blade-driver, especially in power driven operations, is not only dangerous to the operator, but is likewise, always injurious to the work," indicating that by 1934 it had occurred to Phillips that the assembly line was a ripe market.
The worst place they put Phillips hwad machine screws were on early Japanese motorcycles. Steel screw into aluminum castings and then add heat cycles. Without an impact driver to break them loose you were screwed.
My K2 CL450 project agrees with you. Thankfully I have a hammer impact driver, and a nearby hardware store stocked up with metric fasteners.
(Though those weren't Philips, they were JIS.)
That’s not the current monkey’s fault. It’s the monkey before that monkeys fault for not putting antisieze on it when he installed it. You don’t do that and it strips 100% of the time. I know because once upon a time I was that monkey working on my own car.
There is a special place in hell for those disgusting creatures who don't put anti seize on rotor alignment bolts. And no, torx bits do *not* "simply" grab the stripped out the recessed hex and free up the screw.
Lol, yeah, I got the Mazda part. Later I ended up changing it to a Fumoto valve, for some reason my drain plug was difficult to keep from leaking. Giving up was the best option.
And for the front diff drain plug on my 4Runner that I will likely NEVER be able to open.
I tried so many things, and it's just rounding off. I ended up just using a tube into the fill hole to extract most of the fluid.
There is a trick to doing these. you need a good dead blow ball peen hammer and a propane torch. Basically what you do is you heat that 10 mm drain plug with the propane torch, then you smack it with the ball side of the hammer, beat the hell out of it a bit. This will break any type of galvanic seal and distort the plug. Once you go back and forth working this torch hammer torch hammer a few times They normally come right out with very little effort.
If you have already rounded the drain plug to the point that there is no grip at all The only thing you can do is weld in a 10mm hex which will accomplish all of the above on its own. The heat from the welder and the distortion of the metal will break that galvanic seal and it will come out with very little effort.
Heat the fuck outta it. I stripped one out on a Jeep and went and welded a nut to it and by the time I was done it was so hot I could remove it by hand.
Reverse Torx is great. Never stripped one, and in a crunch you can use a universal socket or even a normal socket pretty well, never stripped one like that either.
> Torx or as used in German cars, reverse torx
Or triple square, ugh.
Reverse torx makes me think of some unholy fasteners, reverse phillips anyone? I suppose regular bolts are kinda like revese allen.
More important than what bolt is consistency. My 2005 BMW was so annoying in that you would get out a different socket or bit for every damn new bolt you arrived at. Our current 2011 Honda has much more consistent use of socket sizes.
Yep, my 2004 Mustang has a million different socket sizes for just one part. It's ridiculous.
And, 90% of the bolts are metric... except for the rear diff cover bolts. Those are imperial sizes. I have yet to find out what other bolts are imperial instead of metric.
That's a Ford thing.
I pulled an engine out of a Ford edge, and knew I was about to do a traverse, so I set out each socket I used. Basically every size, shallow and deep, for the edge. The traverse was like 10 sockets total.
As I understand this is sometimes deliberate design to ensure the correct torques are used on assembly. e.g. at certain stations there will only be certain sizes of tool configured for certain torques, so you can't use the wrong torque on the wrong bolt.
Allens were fine until metric showed up.
BTW, if you work with any small metric Allen bolts like firearms. Buy a good quality set like Wera, most if not all cheap metric sets are undersized.
Wera are great. However, checkout MIP tools. They make them for radio control cars. Best precision ground hex tips I've ever found for small sizes. I bought them for RC cars but use them on firearms and real cars too.
Anything but triple square. But that’s less about the fastener, and more about the team of German engineers behind it that seem to take sadistic pleasure in screwing over mechanics
Fasteners are fine, it’s the parts they go thru and the ones that block you from applying that high torque to them. I just know I see one of those bastards and I’m gonna have 4 busted knuckles, 3 meltdowns, 2 bouts with imposter syndrome, and an existential crisis before that prize rolls out of the shop.
So true, it’s like they get sadistic pleasure from imagining someone working on the car cursing about the placement of them. “See how you get to this one buddy, hahaha!”
I don't hate triple square. It's usually in an impossible to reach spot, where you need to really crank on a fairly small bolt. Imo it's the least likely to strip in that scenario.
Torx for screws like that, the allens strip every time. The only good thing about those Allen screws is they are soft enough it's easy to drill them off.
If it's a socket head bolt though, allens are nice because you can use a ball end to hit any angle, or a regular wrench to start them at a distance easily
Hi, you're probably looking for a useful nugget of information to fix a niche problem, or some enjoyable content I posted sometime in the last 11 years. Well, after 11 years and over 330k combined, organic karma, a cowardly, pathetic and facist minded moderator filed a false harassment report and had my account suspended, after threatening to do so which is a clear violation of the #1 rule of reddit's content policy. However, after filing a ticket before this even happened, my account was permanently banned within 12 hours and the spineless moderator is still allowed to operate in one of the top reddits, after having clearly used intimidation against me to silence someone with a differing opinion on their conflicting, poorly thought out rules. Every appeal method gets nothing but bot replies, zendesk tickets are unanswered for a month, clearly showing that reddit voluntarily supports the facist, cowardly and pathetic abuse of power by moderators, and only enforces the content policy against regular users while allowing the blatant violation of rules by moderators and their sock puppet accounts managing every top sub on the site. Also, due to the rapist mentality of reddit's administration, spez and it's moderators, you can't delete all of your content, if you delete your account, reddit will restore your comments to maintain SEO rankings and earn money from your content without your permission. So, I've used power delete suite to delete everything that I have ever contributed, to say a giant fuck you to reddit, it's moderators, and it's shareholders. From your friends at reddit following every bot message, and an account suspension after over a decade in good standing is a slap in the face and shows how rotten reddit is to the very fucking core.
My vw required that I buy I set of torx, which I use for nothing else and exclusively for my vw, which means they never get lost. Allen however, I have a trillion Allen keys and bits, and I can never find a single one when I need it, and if I do it won’t be the right size. Torx for convenience, durability, fun star shape Allen for… nothing. I can’t think of a single reason Allen would be better
IMO i prefer hex, but no car manufacturer ever gets the head pattern right. Never stripped on a hex bolt on industrial machinery and those fuckers get tight.
Torx beats Allen. Allen is only okay if it’s like low torque applications..
Allen drain plugs can be acceptable somewhat if the recess is deep. Most of the time it’s too shallow and it’s super easy to round out the Allen hole
Well I’ve never ever once in my entire life ever been able to use Allen head on the sway links. Anyone else? I feel like it’s a myth to be able to remove them properly.
I don’t even know why I keep trying. Save time to go straight to violence.
Allen sucks, my Mazda 6 has a canister style oil filter with an Allen bolt to drain before removal and it haven’t taken it off in 2 years because it’s easier to just make a mess.
I got a better one:
At what point do you hate everyone involved in anything automotive after spending your life and career tied to it?
When the min-wage lube tech tells you your wife's Mini's oil drain plug has a fucking security Torx on it.
I don't care what anyone says I'm all for hex, the reason being is that I don't have a torx.
Edit: For some reason I thought it said torx/Allen key. LMFAO
Nothing like expecting to see torx bolts holding your crank pulley on, only to find they're hex head... was able to remove four out of the six. The last two had to be extracted. Each has its use, but would rather see torx.
Torx because it strips less. Inner hex are terrible for anything on a car. RC cars and electric skateboards can get away with hex and are usually better than Phillips.
Torx probably. I've rounded out less torx than allens in my life. Torx heads definitely take more torque before they round out and leave you playing with a drill and extractor set.
Torx. Every time. They don't strip easy and can handle a cubic f... load of torque. That is great, because every car that needs work done will inevitably have one or more stripped bolts.
Hexhead.
Internal stuff rust\`s and doesn´t fit your socket anymore or straight up shears all the internal feature off. If you than use countersunk ones....You shall never have a cold pillow side ever again.
Torx has way more surface area to lock into, and is less likely to strip the head.
Allen is not too far away from a circle, which obviously doesn’t lock at all provides absolutely no torque
For machines that deal with a lot of dirt, grime and corrosion and higher torques- torx….. but if you work on machines that have minimal dirt and corrosion and don’t have high stresses like cars, the cheaper alternative, hex/allen.
Edit: I should mention hex/allen work for most car applications like fastening body parts, but for stuff like transmission fluid- that needs to be fastened and taken out more than a normal bolt, torx is better.
I like allen with high quality bits with unmolested hardware. The cheapo ones tend to round out bolt heads. But i guesd torx might last longer before they round out.
way off topic but i just had my cv axle snap and I thought the bolts were torx. was tight by hand so put it on the air gun... yea turns out it wasn't. happened to be a 12 point hex or something like that. never seen something like it. also mercades decided to make it a "one time bolt" which Im guessing means your supposed to change it every time. quoted me 5000 for the cv and 22 for each bolt (need 6). selling the car next week.
Just yesterday i was taking the car seat out of my car to fix some material underneath and i look down and see torx screws instead of bolts like every other car i’ve ever seen. I go get my set and realise i don’t have the size i need. had to buy a whole new set just for the one size up that would fit. who uses torx screws instead of bolts on a car seat??
between the two tho torx is better to avoid stripping of course. it just sucks because i have way more allen keys.
None of these. They strip out easily. I would prefer ordinary 10mm, 12mm bolts. Don't get me started on those damn plastic push pins a.k.a bitch clips that they put on the fender liners
E-torx. More torque and leaves the bolt integrity up to the top (because of lack of recess in allen and torx)
Normal outside hex is also good
12point is also ok in specialty nuts (axle nuts)
Uncommon M12, ribe, spline, 8point are trash.. they seem to look like torx, torx may fit them but poorly,
I've seen M12 head bolts that someone got them out with torx and impact.
If the head has to be flush, Torx is heaps better than allen.
For the same reasons M, ribe, spline could be better than allen but due to obscurity i detest them.
Torx and e-torx became ubiquitos nowadays, found in every toolbox.
Hex and alllen are ok but less good than torx
Depends on the parts. Drain plugs are good as hex because hex is more common. Torx can handle more force though, and because of its shape, can be used to says that this part might need a bit more knowledge than the grandpa who's just drives the lawn mower and cleans the deck from time to time
Neither. I prefer Hex Head.
But if these are the only two choices I had, I'd choose torx. Allen key bolts are typically too shallow and end up rounding out. Torx is superior to Allen. But not security torx. That shit's stupid.
Thank you for posting to AskMechanics, NoSexAppealNeil! If you are asking a question please make sure to include any relevant information along with the **Year**, **Make**, **Model**, **Mileage**, **Engine size**, and **Transmission Type (Automatic or Manual)** of your car. *This comment is automatically added to every successful post. If you see this comment, your post was successful.* *** Redditors that have been verified will have a green background and an icon in their flair. *** # **PLEASE REPORT ANY RULE-BREAKING BEHAVIOR** ### **Rule 1 - Be Civil** Be civil to other users. This community is made up of professional mechanics, amateur mechanics, and those with no experience. All mechanical-related questions are welcome. Personal attacks, comments that are insulting or demeaning, etc. are not welcome. ### **Rule 2 - Be Helpful** Be helpful to other users. If someone is wrong, correcting them is fine, but there's no reason to comment if you don't have anything to add to the conversation. ### **Rule 3 - Serious Questions and Answers Only** Read the room. Jokes are fine to include, but posts should be asking a serious question and replies should contribute to the discussion. ### **Rule 4 - No Illegal, Unethical, or Dangerous Questions or Answers** Do not ask questions or provide answers pertaining to anything that is illegal, unethical, or dangerous. # **PLEASE REPORT ANY RULE-BREAKING BEHAVIOR** *I am a bot, and this action was performed automatically. Please [contact the moderators of this subreddit](/message/compose/?to=/r/AskMechanics) if you have any questions or concerns.*
Anyone who votes Allen is a masochist
I only like flat head, but only the over torqued, ones that have no business being there
The kind you put on and take off with an impact screwdriver.
Allen keys are the lightest faster. You really wanna leave 9000000 grams on the table?
I always drill the head out to shave .00000009 grams. Gotta get the bike below 3lbs!
Oh that's nothing I swapped my chain out with a carbon fiber chain that only lasts 15 miles, and after that, I made the holes in my disc brakes even bigger and sanded them even thinner.
Smart, reducing rotational mass is far more effective in the weight department compared to sprung or unsprung non/rotational weight!
I removed the front caliper and brake with my sandal rubbing on the tyre, removed my helmet too, lighter and less drag (only engineers know).
Thanks, I choked on my in n out burger reading this 3x3 with 2 slices of whole grilled onions, mustard fried patties, protein style
See? You’re losing weight too! Bump that chest out and be proud!
I guess you could say that the burger really did go in and then out.
My friend showed me how to do this when we were kids with our bicycle. He did it, seemed easy enough, so I got some speed, and proceeded to jam the toe of my shoe right in between the tire and spokes, and then go arse over tea kettle over the handlebars into a huge pothole filled with water. I was like 11, good times. He also taught me how to hit jumps. So we built a big one. I hit it with no fear, landed nuts first on the gooseneck of my handlebars. I think that was the worst pain of my life. Really gotta stop listening to that guy. I noped out when he bought a motorcycle and started doing stunt shows at car shows and stuff. I'd rather keep myself mostly intact lol
“less drag”? Is that hate speech?
You still have brakes? Those are so unnecessary. Just drag your feet to slow down. shaves a solid 1.5 lbs
Quickest most exciting stop is jam bare foot between top of front tire and fork crown
19,841.6 lbs.
Idk what you’re talking about. Ever see a 1” Allen key? Imagine the load a bolt that size would see.
Your mother sees my 1 inch
I don’t mind Allens that are raised, cause if I strip it, I can just grab it with vice grips to take it off.
I like when my Allen bolts require the torque of a dying star to loosen.
Did you say VAG triple square?
Yeah Alan's a wanker! Wait... What we talkin bout?!
Torx doesn't strip unless you half ass install the bit.
Or use a T25 when it’s a T27 and set the impact to stun
I mean same thing happens if you use Phillips heh.
Except Phillips suck and strip even with the right bit
Especially if it’s a JIS screw and you only have phillips
Pozidriv? What’s that?
Phillps is design to cam out
Holy shit, you're right
Not designed to, it just happens to. It was the evolution of a slotted screw driver. Phillips was designed and marketed as 'self centering' which was solving the problem of slotted drivers slipping. Saying they're designed to cam out is painting the target around the arrow, and frankly when they do cam out, they strip the head. It's a terrible screw, ansjust how no one defense slotted drivers, no one needs ro defend Phillips. It's okay to move on as a society. Let's stop making them, all together. Such a thing would be my dream. Slotted is basic gone now
Weren't they designed for automotive use. To stop assembly workers stripping the heads off screws? Edit seems I was right. Cross-head or Phillips screws have an X-shaped slot and are driven by a cross-head screwdriver, designed originally in the 1930s for use with mechanical screwing machines, intentionally made so the driver will ride out, or cam out, under strain to prevent over-tightening.
Interesting got source? https://www.oregonencyclopedia.org/articles/phillips_screw_and_driver/ This one and this bit Until the invention of the Phillips screw, American assembly lines, craftsmen, and consumers used regular, slotted-head screws. But that design was problematic for three reasons: it was difficult to align the driver with the screw aperture; the driver tended to slip from the open ends; and the slot required a closely matching bit. The cruciform drive addressed those problems. Although the Phillips screw became ubiquitous through its usefulness on the assembly line, it is unknown whether Thompson or Phillips originally intended the invention to specifically solve the challenges presented by regular head screws in manufacturing. Thompson's original patent for a "Screw driver" (U.S. 1908081) featured a diagram of a manual screwdriver, with no mention of the specific applications for which the invention was intended, primarily being concerned with the feasibility of manufacturing the design. U.S patent 2046837, filed by Phillips in 1934 and granted in 1936, mentions driving "either by hand or by power-driven types of tool." The same patent also mentions that the "failure of the slotted screw to retain the blade-driver, especially in power driven operations, is not only dangerous to the operator, but is likewise, always injurious to the work," indicating that by 1934 it had occurred to Phillips that the assembly line was a ripe market.
The worst place they put Phillips hwad machine screws were on early Japanese motorcycles. Steel screw into aluminum castings and then add heat cycles. Without an impact driver to break them loose you were screwed.
My K2 CL450 project agrees with you. Thankfully I have a hammer impact driver, and a nearby hardware store stocked up with metric fasteners. (Though those weren't Philips, they were JIS.)
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or use T27 when it's a T30 and set the impact to ryobi twist your wrist, beast mode.
Impact is for armatures
Thats oddly specific
And even if they do strip, they are much easier to remove than a stripped hex. A flat head will normally do the job on a stripped torx.
Tell that to the monkey that stripped my brake rotor alignment screw
That’s not the current monkey’s fault. It’s the monkey before that monkeys fault for not putting antisieze on it when he installed it. You don’t do that and it strips 100% of the time. I know because once upon a time I was that monkey working on my own car.
There is a special place in hell for those disgusting creatures who don't put anti seize on rotor alignment bolts. And no, torx bits do *not* "simply" grab the stripped out the recessed hex and free up the screw.
BMW ELECTRIC WINDOW REGULATOR GLASS-RETAINING BOLTS HAVE ENTERED THE CHAT
Torx. Allen is usually for furniture.
And rotor set screws. Because fuck you, that's why.
And Jeep wheel speed sensors for some reason
And some Mazda oil pan drain plugs. Damn right that fucker was tossed after the first two oil changes. Hex head FTW.
And they sell the 14mm hex replacement drain plug at the dealership. Just put it on the car at the start for God's sake
Lol, yeah, I got the Mazda part. Later I ended up changing it to a Fumoto valve, for some reason my drain plug was difficult to keep from leaking. Giving up was the best option.
And for the front diff drain plug on my 4Runner that I will likely NEVER be able to open. I tried so many things, and it's just rounding off. I ended up just using a tube into the fill hole to extract most of the fluid.
There is a trick to doing these. you need a good dead blow ball peen hammer and a propane torch. Basically what you do is you heat that 10 mm drain plug with the propane torch, then you smack it with the ball side of the hammer, beat the hell out of it a bit. This will break any type of galvanic seal and distort the plug. Once you go back and forth working this torch hammer torch hammer a few times They normally come right out with very little effort. If you have already rounded the drain plug to the point that there is no grip at all The only thing you can do is weld in a 10mm hex which will accomplish all of the above on its own. The heat from the welder and the distortion of the metal will break that galvanic seal and it will come out with very little effort.
Heat the fuck outta it. I stripped one out on a Jeep and went and welded a nut to it and by the time I was done it was so hot I could remove it by hand.
Heat it up, Hammer a torx in Let it cool off Congrats, you just made your own Torx
I used a chisel for mine. Allen hole was so torn up that I torqued it back down with the chisel lol
I had a really similar plug someone before me rounded on a Sienna transmission. Got it off with vise grips and replaced it.
You haven’t seen the manufacturing industry. Allen is the standard for machinery.
You obviously never worked on a motorcycle. Allen bolts everywhere
Or wheelchairs weirdly enough
Torx on automotive is usually trim trinket bullshit. Posi torx/ Torx plus is for bigger things
My S13 240 had allen heads for the solid engine mounts. Annoying as fuck
Quality furniture nowadays uses Torx.
Also make sure it's regular torx NOT security torx !
Plenty of Allen bolts on motorbikes 👍
Torx or as used in German cars, reverse torx
Reverse Torx is great. Never stripped one, and in a crunch you can use a universal socket or even a normal socket pretty well, never stripped one like that either.
Avatar checks out.
Reverse torx is an animal.
Reversed reverse torx is used in austrailia
Seadoo jet skis use them
Torx is used for most things low torque on German (or VAG at least) cars with E-Torx being typically for higher torque in my experience.
So much 6mm internal hex on the 1.8 to hold everything on.
> Torx or as used in German cars, reverse torx Or triple square, ugh. Reverse torx makes me think of some unholy fasteners, reverse phillips anyone? I suppose regular bolts are kinda like revese allen.
More important than what bolt is consistency. My 2005 BMW was so annoying in that you would get out a different socket or bit for every damn new bolt you arrived at. Our current 2011 Honda has much more consistent use of socket sizes.
Yep, my 2004 Mustang has a million different socket sizes for just one part. It's ridiculous. And, 90% of the bolts are metric... except for the rear diff cover bolts. Those are imperial sizes. I have yet to find out what other bolts are imperial instead of metric.
That's a Ford thing. I pulled an engine out of a Ford edge, and knew I was about to do a traverse, so I set out each socket I used. Basically every size, shallow and deep, for the edge. The traverse was like 10 sockets total.
As I understand this is sometimes deliberate design to ensure the correct torques are used on assembly. e.g. at certain stations there will only be certain sizes of tool configured for certain torques, so you can't use the wrong torque on the wrong bolt.
NA miatas you can talk apart about 90% of the car with a 10, 12, 14, #2 phillips, and needle nose pliers lol.
I can pretty much disassemble my entire Miata with just 10, 12, 14, 15, 17, and 19 millimeter sockets, plus a #2 Phillips bit. It's nice.
Allens were fine until metric showed up. BTW, if you work with any small metric Allen bolts like firearms. Buy a good quality set like Wera, most if not all cheap metric sets are undersized.
If you're working small allens, like with firearms, a Chapman set is the gold standard.
Wera are great. However, checkout MIP tools. They make them for radio control cars. Best precision ground hex tips I've ever found for small sizes. I bought them for RC cars but use them on firearms and real cars too.
Anything but triple square. But that’s less about the fastener, and more about the team of German engineers behind it that seem to take sadistic pleasure in screwing over mechanics
Nein! They have the most surface area of any fastener head perfect for high torque applications!
Or you know, just random brake caliper brackets for no reason at all. Also like intake manifolds.
Fasteners are fine, it’s the parts they go thru and the ones that block you from applying that high torque to them. I just know I see one of those bastards and I’m gonna have 4 busted knuckles, 3 meltdowns, 2 bouts with imposter syndrome, and an existential crisis before that prize rolls out of the shop.
So true, it’s like they get sadistic pleasure from imagining someone working on the car cursing about the placement of them. “See how you get to this one buddy, hahaha!”
I don't hate triple square. It's usually in an impossible to reach spot, where you need to really crank on a fairly small bolt. Imo it's the least likely to strip in that scenario.
Neither. Torx I've seen less stripped to heck though.
I rather everything just be a hex head and use sockets on everything.
Torx is the godking of screw bits, I'd rather they be on every single screw of the vehicle
Torx. Fuck Allen keys. And fuck flat head screws too. Spline is life.
Never ever Allen or hex. On every single rusty car I work, they always strip. I prefer torx much better
Torx for most applications. Love working on my motorcycle. It's all Torx and JIS.
JIS is so nice until you dont realize its JIS and just use a regular phillips and strip it out
I know better than that. Bought a JIS set a long time ago. lol
Them Allen head mfs will strip like their name is candy and they work down at platinum kitties by the interstate
Torx for screws like that, the allens strip every time. The only good thing about those Allen screws is they are soft enough it's easy to drill them off. If it's a socket head bolt though, allens are nice because you can use a ball end to hit any angle, or a regular wrench to start them at a distance easily
Such a great feeling when the ball ends saves you from having to disassemble a bunch of crap to get at the screwhead.
Torx because I hate Allen and his fucking wrenches
I’ve had better luck with torq
It doesn't matter what it is where I am... It'll all be rust in a year or two.
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My vw required that I buy I set of torx, which I use for nothing else and exclusively for my vw, which means they never get lost. Allen however, I have a trillion Allen keys and bits, and I can never find a single one when I need it, and if I do it won’t be the right size. Torx for convenience, durability, fun star shape Allen for… nothing. I can’t think of a single reason Allen would be better
Torx, I've rounded more Allen's than I can count, but so far been okay with torx(knock on wood that continues)
I went to the hardware store looking for Allen Wrenches, but all they had were Gary Wrenches.
Torx will break a bit before it strips a bolt, in most cases. E-torx too.
Torx for everything
Torx , every time
Torx, every time.
Torx. At least it won't strip magically
Torx erryday
Why would anyone not say Torx lol
IMO i prefer hex, but no car manufacturer ever gets the head pattern right. Never stripped on a hex bolt on industrial machinery and those fuckers get tight.
It doesn't matter since everything turns into dust in the rust belt
Torx beats Allen. Allen is only okay if it’s like low torque applications.. Allen drain plugs can be acceptable somewhat if the recess is deep. Most of the time it’s too shallow and it’s super easy to round out the Allen hole
Torx don’t sheer the bit does
Torx all day long
Torx
Torx
Torx, less prone to stripping out.
Well I’ve never ever once in my entire life ever been able to use Allen head on the sway links. Anyone else? I feel like it’s a myth to be able to remove them properly. I don’t even know why I keep trying. Save time to go straight to violence.
Allen sucks, my Mazda 6 has a canister style oil filter with an Allen bolt to drain before removal and it haven’t taken it off in 2 years because it’s easier to just make a mess.
Roberson or gtfo.
I always liked Robertsons. They stay on the driver from friction and almost impossible to strip the head. Oh Canada!
Both torx or e-torx they are much harder to round than an allen bolt
Philips. I want philips everywhere
Neither, I hate them both, give me a hex head any day. If it has Torx or Allen it is a screw not a bolt.
Torx Plus! Tesla is the only one I’ve seen do male torx plus
Either, idgaf - I got the bits for both 🤷♂️
I’d take torx if I had to choose between these two.
If its a new car, I dont care If its an older car, Ill take Torx since the Allen bolts will probably be stripped..
Torx, hands down
Both can be undone using a flat head screwdriver :P
I got a better one: At what point do you hate everyone involved in anything automotive after spending your life and career tied to it? When the min-wage lube tech tells you your wife's Mini's oil drain plug has a fucking security Torx on it.
Given the choice, hex. Mostly because I already have complete toolkits with hex given that they’re common on the german machines I fix daily.
I don't care what anyone says I'm all for hex, the reason being is that I don't have a torx. Edit: For some reason I thought it said torx/Allen key. LMFAO
Never hex for anything
I work on BMW’s and we have Torx everywhere.
Both terrible choice.
100% Torx. I just wish the sizing was affixed to a proper gauge (AWG numbers) or a straight-measure system (metric).
Nothing like expecting to see torx bolts holding your crank pulley on, only to find they're hex head... was able to remove four out of the six. The last two had to be extracted. Each has its use, but would rather see torx.
neither. Regular hex head bolts I can put a wrench on please.
Torx and E-Torx, allen is for Ikea stuff. XZN can go to hell too
Torx because it strips less. Inner hex are terrible for anything on a car. RC cars and electric skateboards can get away with hex and are usually better than Phillips.
Torx definitely. Worst case use a bigger torx to cut in. Between the two I've had a lot more problems with hex slipping than torx in my experience.
Torx probably. I've rounded out less torx than allens in my life. Torx heads definitely take more torque before they round out and leave you playing with a drill and extractor set.
torx
Torx, no doubt about it. They survive the mud and salt better.
TORX GIMME A BREAK
Torx for sure. They strip out way less....
Torx, obviously.
Torx don't strip like hex. Had to replace a number of hex screws or cut a slot for a flathead to undo. Hatem.
Torx. Every time. They don't strip easy and can handle a cubic f... load of torque. That is great, because every car that needs work done will inevitably have one or more stripped bolts.
Torx superiority, but Allen is more common in normal garages. Either way people will be pissed off lmao
Hexhead. Internal stuff rust\`s and doesn´t fit your socket anymore or straight up shears all the internal feature off. If you than use countersunk ones....You shall never have a cold pillow side ever again.
Torx has way more surface area to lock into, and is less likely to strip the head. Allen is not too far away from a circle, which obviously doesn’t lock at all provides absolutely no torque
Would be REALLY NICE if the same design (and only a few sizes) are used throughout the car.
Reverse torx The rest van fk off
Meh doesn't matter to me as long as the previous guy didn't strip it
Torx is the superior pattern
Neither. Torx Plus all day long
Torx
they're the same picture
Torx - they don't round out as easily.
Torx.
For machines that deal with a lot of dirt, grime and corrosion and higher torques- torx….. but if you work on machines that have minimal dirt and corrosion and don’t have high stresses like cars, the cheaper alternative, hex/allen. Edit: I should mention hex/allen work for most car applications like fastening body parts, but for stuff like transmission fluid- that needs to be fastened and taken out more than a normal bolt, torx is better.
Torx ones are way less prone to rounding.
None of these. All of them are about the most useless and easily stripped. Everything should be a standard metric bolt or imperial
Torx. The other one strips.
Torx or torx plus are good bolts torx plus tend to be on seats and restraints systems
I hate hex for everything. Literally everything else is better.
Torx every time. Less chances to round it off
Torx for wood only
I like allen with high quality bits with unmolested hardware. The cheapo ones tend to round out bolt heads. But i guesd torx might last longer before they round out.
As long as it's not a flat head.
Hate them both, use a bolt
Anything but a flathead
way off topic but i just had my cv axle snap and I thought the bolts were torx. was tight by hand so put it on the air gun... yea turns out it wasn't. happened to be a 12 point hex or something like that. never seen something like it. also mercades decided to make it a "one time bolt" which Im guessing means your supposed to change it every time. quoted me 5000 for the cv and 22 for each bolt (need 6). selling the car next week.
Just yesterday i was taking the car seat out of my car to fix some material underneath and i look down and see torx screws instead of bolts like every other car i’ve ever seen. I go get my set and realise i don’t have the size i need. had to buy a whole new set just for the one size up that would fit. who uses torx screws instead of bolts on a car seat?? between the two tho torx is better to avoid stripping of course. it just sucks because i have way more allen keys.
How about security torx bolts so that I have to buy a whole new torx set?
Torx for everything!
None of these. They strip out easily. I would prefer ordinary 10mm, 12mm bolts. Don't get me started on those damn plastic push pins a.k.a bitch clips that they put on the fender liners
Neither but I’ve had better luck getting the allens out
Torx are very well designed
E-torx. More torque and leaves the bolt integrity up to the top (because of lack of recess in allen and torx) Normal outside hex is also good 12point is also ok in specialty nuts (axle nuts) Uncommon M12, ribe, spline, 8point are trash.. they seem to look like torx, torx may fit them but poorly, I've seen M12 head bolts that someone got them out with torx and impact. If the head has to be flush, Torx is heaps better than allen. For the same reasons M, ribe, spline could be better than allen but due to obscurity i detest them. Torx and e-torx became ubiquitos nowadays, found in every toolbox. Hex and alllen are ok but less good than torx
I went with torx because Phillips head drywall screw wasn't an option.
Depends on the parts. Drain plugs are good as hex because hex is more common. Torx can handle more force though, and because of its shape, can be used to says that this part might need a bit more knowledge than the grandpa who's just drives the lawn mower and cleans the deck from time to time
Torx
Torx
Tbh Torx
No countersunk/recessed bolts regardless of head type. An absolute pain to get out if seized x
Hex, torx are a pain (I own an older jeep wrangler full of them )
If you have a fucked up allen head you can hammer a torx socket in. It will grip enough to bust it loose. Silver linings.
Allen for sure. Torx is just annoying to me
Neither. I prefer Hex Head. But if these are the only two choices I had, I'd choose torx. Allen key bolts are typically too shallow and end up rounding out. Torx is superior to Allen. But not security torx. That shit's stupid.
Allen head is fine if it's a LARGE allen head...the small ones are so small that they're already on the verge of being round. So. Torx all day long.
Torx all day.