Norbar Articles
Norbar for Brad Jones Racing
Precision Instruments for a Precision Machine
Brad Jones Racing (BJR) competes at the highest level of Australian motorsport – the Repco Supercars Championship.
To succeed in the category, you need absolute perfection in all areas. There is simply no room for compromise when it comes to preparing a thoroughbred racing machine like the BJR ZB Commodore.
There are two key factors when it comes to preparing a racing car at the highest level; the best parts and the highest attention to detail. The team’s use of Norbar Torque wrenches and the TruCheck Torque Verification tool is a great example of this philosophy.
We caught up with Paul Hartsuyker at BJR to explain the importance of Norbar to the team’s success.
Why does BJR use Norbar Torque wrenches?
PH: ‘In a professional race environment, it’s critical that every component that’s built, fitted to the race cars or used within the pits is completed faultlessly. Norbar torque wrenches are vitally important because they make sure that each nut and bolt is set to the ideal tension to ensure reliability and performance.’
What are some key applications for the Norbar torque wrench?
‘Norbar torque wrenches are used throughout the race team for many applications, from torquing the wheel nuts down to torquing every nut in our transaxles. The Sub Assembly department relies on these torque wrenches daily to carry out the accurate rebuilding of components such as steering racks, uprights, tail shafts, transaxles and rattle guns.’
What do you use the TruCheck Torque Verification tool for? Why is it an essential part of Sub Assembly?
‘BJR uses the TruCheck Torque verification tool to accurately check if our Norbar torque wrenches are reading the correct torque and if they require any calibration. This is a critical tool to ensure accuracy in every application that our torque wrenches are carrying out. The TruCheck is used routinely between events to maintain accuracy which is essential when servicing Sub- Assembly components as every rebuild must be flawless, ensuring reliability. Our TruCheck torque verification tool remains at the workshop where we can routinely check the calibration of torque wrenches between events.’
View our range of Torque Verification Tools.
Can you give us some examples of some items that you service with a Norbar torque wrench and the process it involves?
Example 1:
‘Transaxles are a major service item for the Sub-Assembly department and we use three different Norbar torque wrenches to precisely rebuild them. When a transaxle is brought to Sub-Assembly for servicing, technicians strip each component within the transaxle, clean and service parts ready for rebuild. Upon rebuilding a transaxle, the technicians will use multiple torque wrenches to tension various components to the most accurate torque. These include crown wheel bolts, the pinion nut, lay shaft and main shaft nuts and all casing nuts and bolts. We rely on the accuracy of Norbar’s torque wrenches, as any slight variance in tension could affect the transaxle operation.’
Example 2:
‘Pit stop rattle guns are very important to our race team, contributing to consecutive pit stop championships won by BJR. We rely on Norbar torque wrenches to carry out servicing of all rattle guns. Upon servicing, we strip the gun components, clean and service each part, then rebuild the gun where we torque each housing bolt to an exact specification. Once the technician has carried out this service, the rattle guns are returned to the pit stop crew – ready for races. The accuracy of our Norbar torque wrenches is so important as any variance in torque could affect the performance of the rattle guns.’
