Dear Carleton and All,
I have a VW Kombi and the same rule applies. 10 mm and 13 mm for all
bolts except for five. There is a nut on each wheel and another on the
steering wheel. I think that these are 32 mm (I'm not sure because
I've never used them).
It is interesting to consider Dr Ferdinand Porsche's philosophy from a
practical standpoint. To maintain your car your entire toolkit usually
consists of two spanners (wrenches) that are exactly the same – 10 mm
on one end and 13 mm on the other – one to hold the bolt and another
to turn the nut. Your complete everyday toolkit fits into the ruler
pocket on the side of your overall.
The only time you need the 32 mm tool is if ever you need to remove a
wheel – and in my experience that is fairly close to never.
Cheers,
Pat Naughtin
Author of the forthcoming book, Metrication Leaders Guide.
PO Box 305 Belmont 3216,
Geelong, Australia
Phone: 61 3 5241 2008
Metric system consultant, writer, and speaker, Pat Naughtin, has
helped thousands of people and hundreds of companies upgrade to the
modern metric system smoothly, quickly, and so economically that they
now save thousands each year when buying, processing, or selling for
their businesses. Pat provides services and resources for many
different trades, crafts, and professions for commercial, industrial
and government metrication leaders in Asia, Europe, and in the USA.
Pat's clients include the Australian Government, Google, NASA, NIST,
and the metric associations of Canada, the UK, and the USA. See http://www.metricationmatters.com
for more metrication information, contact Pat at [email protected]
or to get the free 'Metrication matters' newsletter go to: http://www.metricationmatters.com/newsletter
to subscribe.
On 2009/06/28, at 9:35 AM, Carleton MacDonald wrote:
I owned a VW Beetle for five years and did all my own maintenance.
The two
wrenches I used were the 10 mm (not 8) and the 13 mm. Even today
they still
show more use than the others.
Carleton
-----Original Message-----
From: [email protected] [mailto:[email protected]] On
Behalf
Of Martin Vlietstra
Sent: Saturday, June 27, 2009 02:40
To: U.S. Metric Association
Subject: [USMA:45274] RE: wrench sizes
I have been told that when Dr Porsche designed the VW Beetle (c
1937), he
made sure that only three sized spanners were needed for maintenance
purposes - I believe that they were 8 mm, 13 mm and 22 mm. Maybe
ant VW
Beetle aficionados out there could confirm this.
-----Original Message-----
From: [email protected] [mailto:[email protected]] On
Behalf
Of Bill Hooper
Sent: 27 June 2009 03:04
To: U.S. Metric Association
Subject: [USMA:45273] wrench sizes
I was browsing in the auto shop while my car was being serviced the
other day and came across something I always "knew" in the abstract
but, about which, I did not know the specific details. Maybe you all
knew this (or similar examples) but here it is in case you didn't.
They were selling two almost identical sets of socket wrenches, one in
Ye Olde English units, the other in metric:
The sizes of the sockets in the Y.O.E. set were:
5/16, 3/8, 7/16, 1/2, 9/16, 5/8 and 3/4 inches.
The sizes of the metric sockets were:
9, 10, 12, 13, 14, 15, and 17 millimetres.
The Olde English units were marked on the sockets with quotation marks
to indicate inches (e.g. 5/16" for five-sixteenths of an inch) while
the metric units were indicated by "MM" for millimetres (e.g. 9 MM for
nine millimetres). The examples show so well how metric is simpler to
understand and easier to use, that one can almost excuse the use of
the wrong symbol for millimetres.
Bill Hooper
72 kg body mass
Fernandina Beach, Florida, USA
