I just tackled the rear shocks and springs. Upon reassembling the new Bilstein shock to the upper mount, I did not have access to the tools to be able to torque the locking nut to the 20-24 ft lb per the FSM. Instead I had an allen wrench and offset box head wrench to hand tighten it as much as I could.

What's the consensus on how much torque can be applied by hand, and how would I even go about torqing to the specs with the way it designed?

 

Tighten it until the bushings expand to the same size as the washer. 24ftlbs isn't very tight at all.

 

Thank you for the fast response. I'm not quite sure what you are referring to though. Could you please clarify?

I know the locking nut sits on top of the washer that came with the new shocks, which sits on top of the OEM mount package.

 

Use the old german torque rating of gutentight.

 

Ive done this many times and just used normal fore arm strength, never had a problem.