Amazon: Pinion nut torque Diff rebuild

[Classic rally]

Hi
I have just rebuilt my diff. I have changed the bearings, seal but could not get new pinion shims so used the old ones. There were 3 shims on the pinion.

I am having a real problem torquing down the pinion nut. I have watched the video on amazon cars which is helpful. It gives a torque value of 280 to 300 newton meters (nm). The facebook group gave me figures from the haynes manual of 220 to 240 nm I believe.

The issue is that when I torque the nut to 130 nm which is the maximum my torque bar goes to the pinion is so tight that I can no longer turn it by hand. If I torque it to 280 or 300nm it will be so much tighter it may ruin the bearing. From my understanding you should be able to turn the pinion by hand and using feel, feel if there is too much or too little play but it should turn by hand.

Has anyone done this job before? I would be grateful for some guidance please as I don't understand how the haynes manual and other sources quote such high torque settings.

Thanks