Leaderboard

The trouble I've had with cheap worm clamps is mostly due to soft metal deforming. Bands stripping, worm housings opening up and letting the worm skip on the band instead of tightening it, worms coming out of the housing when I try to loosen them. I have yet to find a clamp that doesn't leave some impression on the hose, though obviously the fuel-injection-style clamps are easier on them than the standard worm-drive. I'd say the one in the picture was on there pretty tight, but I don't see any cracks or tearing, so I would not assume that the hose was compromised. I don't see a second impression from an earlier clamp. At the 13 lbs the rad cap limits the cooling system to, I would expect a properly spec'd spring clamp and a properly tightened worm or wire clamp to be functionally identical. I would not expect the steering return to be much higher, as all it's doing is lifting fluid a couple of feet and dumping it back into the reservoir. (The steering pressure line runs over 1k psi at idle, so it's not assembled with hose clamps.) I'm not sure what pressure the trans cooler runs. IIRC it feeds a lube passage in the trans, rather than just dumping right back into the pan, so I imagine it's got a little pressure behind it. I ran a plastic external trans filter on mine for a while, and it didn't explode, so clearly it's not too awful high. I understand the advantage of spring clamps for thermal expansion. Personally, I have an easier time trusting a clamp that I remember tightening than one that I just sorta let go of and hoped for the best. Looks like there's a hybrid of the two clamp types out there, too. Looks like a standard worm clamp with a stack of Belleville springs between the worm drive and the housing.