School me on torque wrenches

I'm not sure what is different with bikes, but for a car, any torque wrench you can get at Harbor Freight will be good enough

Edit:  So, I just went to Park Tools to see what they offered, and they sell 1/4" and 1/2" drive old-school "line" torque wrenches, and 1/4" and 1/2" drive "click stop" wrenches.

I would assume that you would want the ratcheting click stop variety.... and I'd say that you want to just go to Harbor Freight and pick up one of their for $15.

The Park Tools wrench has a range of 26-132 inch pounds and lists on Amazon for over $100 ($115 at my LBS), the Harbor Freight tool has a range of 20-200 and is $15.  I've worked on my car with the Harbor Freight tool and I'd trust it implicitly.

NOT.

 As mentioned The Park one is good, there are other cheaper options as mentioned, You just need one that has a range from around 2Nm to 10Nm  or so, I also like to cary a couple of Ritchie Torque Keys On the Bike I keep a 4 and a 5Nm Key in the seat bag the 5 has 3 interchangeable Hex bits and allow me to adjust just about anything on the bike if the need arises.

Following this advice may very well let you know how it feels to trash a brand new frame.

^^This^^  I have a Craftsman that I bought about 10 years ago, and it's served all my needs for both my bike and motorcycle.

A couple observations...

Be careful of the units on the torque wrench.  I almost just pulled on of the ones I use for motorcycle wrenching but they are calibrated for KNm.  Not Nm.  If you get one for low torque uses or one specifically for bikes, you are good.

About the "go by feel" - I can sort of agree with that, but it's always safer to use a wench until you know what it "feels" like.

For example my cervelo seatpost bolt says 4Nm max.  I was surprised how tight that it (and many bolts can go tighter).  It was probably tighter than I would do by hand unless I really leaned into it.  I was having trouble with my saddle sliding down during rides using hand tightening so got the wrench to max it out at 4Nm.  That and some carbon paste and it's fine.

If I have to make adjustments on the fly, I just remember how many revolutions I use and use the same to go back.  Again, for example, if I need to adjust my saddle, I will spin out the bolt exactly 720 degrees, make my adjustments, then screw it back in exactly 720 degrees.

I too am looking for a torque wrench for my new bike....Does the craftsman option have a range of settings?  I'm a newbie on torque wrenches so I probably have my terminology wrong here but my LBS said the various adjustment locations around the bike have different sizes (this may be where my terminology is wrong) so any tool I buy needs to have a "range"...

"Setting", probably not (not to say there aren't some versions that you can set it to display 1-10nm, then switch it over to show 10-100nm or similar).  But they are like socket wrenches but have allen heads.  So you pick the right allen head you need and snap it on.  That's what the LBS meant by various adjustment locations.  For example, you seat post is probably 4mm, everything on the bars/stem/etc is 6mm.

When I bought my park tool, it was just the wrench.  I had to bay a seperate set of allen socket wrench heads to go with it.

http://www.craftsman.com/shc/s/s_10155_12602_Hand+Tools_Wrenches_Torque+Wrenches?sid=ISx20110429x00001&psid=64x2998

I'm not sure if some of these clicker types can be set to newton meters though.  But you can always do a conversion.

Every torque wrench has a range of settings. I have a 1/4-inch Harbor Freight one that can be adjusted from 20 to 200 inch-lbs. The only advantage I see to spending the extra money (almost 10 times as much. for less range) and buying a bike-specific torque wrench like Park's is so you don't have to convert Newton-meters to inch-pounds. Otherwise there are many free phone apps that will do that for you.

For stems and seatposts, the little doohickey ones that are preset for 5 Newton/Meters are good. For the rest of your bike (cranks, etc) get a good one that gives you feedback that you have reached the set torque. The longer it is, the easier it will be to use. You can get a nice and pricey Snap On  TW (Craftsman isn't what is used to be anymore) but it will outlast you and you will be able to use it on your vehicle as well (spark plugs, wheel lugs etc).

Man Law # 65. Buy the best tool you can afford. Make it hurt once.

I thought the Harbor Freight ones had Nm on one side and in/lbs on the other?

Will have to look later.

Do yourself a favor and buy yourself one of these:

http://www.westernbikeworks.com/product/ritchey-multi-torqkey-5nm

That will work for set post clamp, stem, handlebars, etc...

I prefer a "clicker style" torque wrench.  I have this one and LOVE it

http://www.craftsman.com/craftsman-micro-clicker-torque-wrench-3-8inch-drive/p-00931424000P?prdNo=7

It has a 10 lb-ft to 75 lb-ft rating, perfect for crank bolts (***Note:  I bought this on black friday for about $30).  Don't forget a set of 3/8 drive hex sockets as well:

http://www.craftsman.com/craftsman-evolv-7-pc-hex-bit-socket-set/p-00910058000P?prdNo=4&blockNo=4&blockType=G4

If you want one for all the "smaller" hardware on the bike, get a 1/4" drive version of the above with the proper range of torques.  You should be able to find the torque ranges for the components on your bike online somewhere (park tools is also an excellent reference).

You can find less expensive torque wrenches that are not clicker style, but they can be hard to use sometimes.  Also, find someone who knows how to use a torque wrench, one click, no bouncing.  If used improperly you can VERY easily over-torque by 20-25%.

I looked at the wrench you linked before buying mine.  That wrench is only good for 20-250 INCH pounds.  It is important to know the difference as some wrenches are rated by FOOT pounds...which is essentiall 12x higher.  10-75 foot pounds is equivalent to 120-900 inch pounds...so clearly the wrench you linked is not 10-75 foot pounds...but more like 1.7-21 foot pounds or 2.3 to 28 newton meters.  Such a wrench is more suitable for smaller hardware on the bike that requires 4-10 nm of torque, but not good enough for a crank that may require about 50 nm of torque.

So just be careful of what you buy and if the rating is in INCH pounds or FOOT pounds.  If you do the newton meter conversion of 4nm = 35 inch pounds...but you torque it to 35 foot pounds...expect to have some cracked carbon.

I picked up Venzo Torque wrench on Amazon.

I needed it primarily to torque the chainring bolts on my crank-based powermeter (10Nm).

But it's handy for everything else (seatpost, etc).

No issues so far, easy to use, nice assortment of bits and a case, and was within my budget.

-ak-

I have an older version of one of those $70 1/2" drive for rebuilding engines.  It reads both ft lb and Nm at the same time (two windows next to each other)

It only goes down to 25 ft lb IIRC, which is perfectly fine for torquing head studs down, but not a FD.

This is especially true with cheaper ones, but torque wrenches lose their accuracy at the extremes first.  So if your wrench goes from 20-200 in lbs, but most of your work is in the 20-30 in lb range, it wasn't the right tool to buy.  a 5-50 in lb or something like that would be better.

Clicker wrenches are very nice.  HOWEVER, they do torque differently than beam type.  Sometimes, and this is very rare, you shouldn't use a clicker wrench.  But the only time I've ever seen this is on the Renault engine in my Lotus - when torquing the head down, you've got to use a beam type or bad things happen.

I have a big HarborFreight clicker wrench (mainly used for Crank-Set and Cog-Set) and a small one from Amazon for Seatpost and Handelbar.

I worked on cars a lot and I don't like to go by feel. After tight comes off!