Help with Towing Eye

[Ryvita]

So, my towing eye is stuck in the car. The car was ferried to the garage when the starter motor conked out, and I forgot to ask them to remove it when I got it back (after a wait for parts).

Could someone please confirm for me which direction the towing eye is threaded? I have a vague recollection that it was anticlockwise threaded, and I don't want to put big torque on it in the wrong direction and snap the fixing off!

For clarity: to unscrew the towing eye should I be turning it clockwise or anticlockwise?

[mik_ok]

I’m possibly too late, but it’s a left handed thread (on my Series1). So clockwise to loosen.

[NDA]

As above - reverse threaded normally. Unscrew clockwise.

[BertBert]

As an aside, does anyone know why it uses a LH thread?

[NDA]

BertBert said:

As an aside, does anyone know why it uses a LH thread?

Multi-stranded cables tend to twist under tension - the lay of the cable means they could unwind (counterclockwise) a towing eye. Whilst modern cables probably don't do this, the safety feature of a reverse thread endures.

[BertBert]

NDA said:

Multi-stranded cables tend to twist under tension - the lay of the cable means they could unwind (counterclockwise) a towing eye. Whilst modern cables probably don't do this, the safety feature of a reverse thread endures.

Oh yes, obvious when you know. Thanks!!

[Ryvita]

NDA said:

Multi-stranded cables tend to twist under tension - the lay of the cable means they could unwind (counterclockwise) a towing eye. Whilst modern cables probably don't do this, the safety feature of a reverse thread endures.

What an interesting fact. Never thought of that!

Just to follow up and close this out, yes, it is indeed reverse threaded and with the aid of the largest spanner I could wedge into it, I managed to get it to shift this past weekend without scraping the surrounding paint thank the gods.

Thank you to all for confirming. i should go buy one of the replacement plastic inserts to stop the threads from gunking up with road dirt now I guess. https://parts.bellandcolvill.co.uk/deroure?qs=1&am...

[NDA]

Glad you got it sorted out.