Suppliers of custom U bolts

Is it daft to suggest just trimming them down?

Cheers Seth- from memory they are different to moggy minor ones, but I can't remember in which way- I'll look into it.

Unfortunately the thread doesn't go up far enough Ben- and 'cos of the way they are made you can't just cut the thread up further.

You might be less pleasantly suprised if you bought some bolts designed to hold static pipework to walls because they were cheap and then they broke when you hit a bump while doing 70 on the motorway because they weren't made from high tensile steel and designed to survive continually changing fatigue loads.

phuq, I know that Minor ones fitted my Oxford so would be surprised if they didn't go on a Marina but I guess there could be differences.

Try marine suppliers. They use them on masts for yachts. Should be strong enough too.

Would you use a bag of unmarked M10 bolts from B&Q to hold the big end caps on when building an engine?

You know what. I don't know. Obviously. I would hope that if I was buying U bolts from an automotive supplier that they would have been made appropriately with their task considered, rather than out of licorice steel that might hold together. Or might not.

You know what. There's always a right way of doing things when messing about with old cars. Of course other ways might work but personally I don't want to take those risks and would rather advise others not to either than suggest they bolt their cars together in a potentially dangerous manner.

Phuq, appologies that my well intentioned suggestions have derailed the thread a bit.

They will probably be stainless, for obvious reasons!

I don't care what telecoms people use to hold their masts up. My reference to engine internals was to demonstrate that it is ridiculous to quote one completely different application to suggest that it is OK on another.

This PDF, clearly mentions that this firm makes their automotive U bolts from Grade 5 or Grade 8 material, grade 8 being the safer choice if the oriignal spec is not known. (I am aware that this grading system is a US spec but that British specs would be along similar lines)

www.fallsautospring.com/ubolttorqspecs.pdf

Here's a handy spec sheet showing the strengths of the various grades of bolt.

www.boltdepot.com/fastener-information/Materials-and-Grades/Bolt-Grade-Chart.aspx

Now if someone wants to bolt their car together using Grade 2 low tensile fixings then perhaps they might think otherwise when they see that these could be half as strong as the bolts that were originally doing the job.

Aah, didn't know the axles were different sizes.