polished stainless bolt kits on ebay....

[mineralgrey01gt]

Well I figured it was about time I shared my experience with fastenerguy's bolt kit for the trx 250r. DO NOT BUY ONE. It is a complete waste of money. I dont know why the lock nuts do not hold. I have lost over 75% of the bolts to it already. My brother just told me he took my 250r for a ride and all the motor mount bolts fell out but one and the front motor mounts are loose (this is all the bolts from the bolt kit). Now they look good but not worth the $100 for them I can promise you. I have already spent another $50 or so in bolts just replacing them. The first time riding my coolant tank fell off and my a-arm and shock bolts were all loose. The next trip the tank mount and head stay bolts all came out. It is definitely not worth the money to buy one. Im going to my parents house this weekend with the intention of replacing all of those piece of crap bolts with good grade A bolts.

[timmersam]

Wish I would have known you were gunna buy one. I also had a bad experience with those bolts stripping. I had to buy a bunch of random stainless bolts.

Sam

[chris46250r]

I have two 250r's with his bolt kits and I haven't had one bolt come loose.

[my88r]

did you use loctite?

[timmersam]

They have a thread lock nut for everyone, I didnt have trouble with them falling off, mine would get fused together and have to break them off.

Sam

[chris46250r]

Originally posted by timmersam
They have a thread lock nut for everyone, I didnt have trouble with them falling off, mine would get fused together and have to break them off.

Sam

That is common with stainless. I put a little grease on every bolt before putting the nut on.

[timmersam]

I didnt realize that, I will do that for my upcoming build. Thanks alot,

Sam

[chris46250r]

On all the bolts that went into the frame ( I didn't use any of the stainless on the motor ) I greased them and ran a nut down it to make sure I didn't screw up any threads in the frame.

[mineralgrey01gt]

i used the supplied lock nuts on every one that was available and none of them stayed tight. I have went back over many bolts and nuts already 2-3 times retightening them. Its just a pain and im not dealing with it anymore. The best part about the kit was that each bag of nuts and bolts were labeled. I didnt use loctite because with past experience on numerous things that ive used lock nuts and washers were good. Just these didnt perform well at all.

[LT250RMan]

Originally posted by chris46250r
That is common with stainless. I put a little grease on every bolt before putting the nut on.

Would'nt that make the bolts come loose easier ? I'm thinking about buying a set of those bolts.

[chris46250r]

Originally posted by LT250RMan
Would'nt that make the bolts come loose easier ? I'm thinking about buying a set of those bolts.

No.

[GOTFEAR]

that's right no good only for show bikes the stainless bolts stretch and seizes up and stays loos all the time you will cause your frame to start cracking in key places. people think stainles bolts are stronger but not true stainles bolts are to soft for heavy work

[chris46250r]

Originally posted by GOTFEAR
that's right no good only for show bikes the stainless bolts stretch and seizes up and stays loos all the time you will cause your frame to start cracking in key places. people think stainles bolts are stronger but not true stainles bolts are to soft for heavy work

Wow I need to go take them bolts out of the 250r I've been riding for 3 years with no problems.

[GOTFEAR]

well if your not having a problem with your bolt kit i wouldn't Chang them you might create a problem

[chris46250r]

Originally posted by GOTFEAR
well if your not having a problem with your bolt kit i wouldn't Chang them you might create a problem

I'm just messing with ya on the WOW comment. I hear of lots of people that dont like or have had bad luck with the stainless kits. I dont know what the deal is.

[GOTFEAR]

to SOFT

[mcarlson1]

i wish i wouldve known this about a week and a half ago i just got my kit in friday! Im not very happy right now. Would it be possible to put grease on the bolt and loctite on the nut or would they contradict themselves?

[wilkin250r]

Originally posted by GOTFEAR
that's right no good only for show bikes the stainless bolts stretch and seizes up and stays loos all the time you will cause your frame to start cracking in key places. people think stainles bolts are stronger but not true stainles bolts are to soft for heavy work

Indeed. Stainless steel is for corrosion resistance, not for strength.

Some real-life numbers might help put it into perspective. Without boring you with the actual calculations, I'll just post the final numbers for shear strength for a 1/4 inch bolt.

Grade 8 = 4500lbs rated minimum shear strength.

Grade 5 = 3700 lbs

Stainless Steel = 3000lbs shear strength.


Since stainless steel has a very low carbon content, it cannot be strenghtened by normal heat treatment. You can see from the numbers above, stainless is much softer than the other common grades.

Even if they don't break, they have other problems due to lack of strength. Because the metal is soft, the threads will defore rather easily, which is why they seize easily. Plus, their softness allows them to stretch more, which is why they are difficult to keep tight. If they stretch, you lose all your tension on the nuts. Once that tension is gone, the nuts are essentially loose and will move and back themselves off the bolts.

[screaminta]

I don't want to get in to it really, but just a general statement is that there are many many different types of stainless steel, and many different types of heat treatments to make them stronger. Generally saying that stainless is not good isn't a true remark. I have seen some stainless that makes even the most stengthened of "steel" look weak. I work in aerospace machining as an engineer so i live and breath this stuff everyday. Also, if a good percentage of airplane fasteners are stainless steel would you really think they are that bad?
Now, that is not to say the the bolt kits on ebay are crap though, probably because the type of stainless used is not suitable.....

[timmersam]

Ha! whats an aeronautic engineer know. ;) Good info from everyone.

[GOTFEAR]

I did a little checking their is two grades of stainless bolts 1 grade is soft and 2 grade is less soft but better

[Rich250RRacer]

I use OEM bolts, why waste the money on stainless? OEM Honda bolts are all high quality.

[mineralgrey01gt]

Originally posted by Rich250RRacer
I use OEM bolts, why waste the money on stainless? OEM Honda bolts are all high quality.


only reason I went with them was for them being convienent (SP) I wish I would have taken the time and ordered all brand new OEM