Zen and the art of bolt removal
Turbogus
Old Time Jeeper
- Posts
- 1,314
- Thanks
- 26
- Location
- Albany, OR
- Vehicle(s)
- '78 CJ 5 Renegade (Black Betty) Motor AMC 360, T150 trans, 20 tc, Dana 30 front and Dana 44 rear w/posi
'96 GMC K1500 Suburban (Big Blue Basterd) fully loaded with over $10k in options
Well, it was time to replace the starter in my '81 E-AMC 150 Econoline w/300. Bottom bolt removed without much effort (9/16 head) but as fr the top bolt it was a reduced head bolt (1/2") showing signs of being corroded in place.
Trying a 3/8 drive socket on a 6 inch extension (nesessary for clearance) try as I might I couldn't budge the dang thing despite my Orangutan arms. No problem I have an old Craftsman 1/2 inch drive with a 16" breaker bar. From under the van a went feeling for the offending bolt and placing the socket on it and again, it took a concerted amount of effort before the socket slipped off of the bolt head, stripping it. :-arrgh
I was about to P!ss on the fire and call the dog on this when my best friend stopped by and relating what I was up to he took a look and he got some of his tools to attack this bolt. First we attempted to drive on a slightly smaller metric throwaway socket with my 5 lb. mallet to drive it on but with a tiny shoulder of the head of that damm bolt we couldn't get enough bite.
I then tried my little Benomatic torch on it to see if I could free it up followed by failed attempt with a pair of needle nosed vice grips. We then tried some penetrating oil and let it set for a spell, then using the throwaway socket impacting the bolt with the mallet again to no avail.
It is very tight quearters in this part of the engine compartment despite the I6 being skinnier than the V8, the exhaust pipe is right in the way with no means of removing it due to other clearance issues.
We then checked to see if we could squeeze in a 4 inch grider to grind the head off of the bolt, but as you can see from the photos it's just too tight. My friend then broke out his Sawzall and with a new metal blade tried to get a bead on the bolt head but the throw of the blade kept throwing him off of his mark. So it was up to my Dremel tool with the kit of tiny 3/4 inch cutoff wheels. To get it even with the axis of the bolt head it took my friend on the top side (from the doghouse nacelle) and me working from underneath to manipulate the switch. We went through 4 cutoff wheels and another attempt with the Sawzall and we were very clse to the mounting flange, so we stopped to see if we could break the starter past what little there was left of the bolt head~it held fast. :-arrgh. Beating it with my 5 lb. mallet to release some frustration and to see if there was any deflection we found the starter was moving a tiny bit. Using the Dremel once again and the cutoff wheels carefully shaving off by the fraction of a millimeter what I thought were the remnants of the bolt head... still it held fast. Taking my mallet and adjusting my body position for better leverage a beat on the starter with all the force I could muster and finally it dropped on my chest with the bolt threads protruding thround the mounting flange on the bellhousing. I bumped it with the trouble light and my frined saw the bolt move a tiny bit~sure enough the bolt was free and now could be removed using my fingers.
you can bet we used a conventional 9/16 head bolt on that damm thing when we mounted up the new starter. Total time spent on this single bolt was 5 1/4 hours.
:-roll
Trying a 3/8 drive socket on a 6 inch extension (nesessary for clearance) try as I might I couldn't budge the dang thing despite my Orangutan arms. No problem I have an old Craftsman 1/2 inch drive with a 16" breaker bar. From under the van a went feeling for the offending bolt and placing the socket on it and again, it took a concerted amount of effort before the socket slipped off of the bolt head, stripping it. :-arrgh
I was about to P!ss on the fire and call the dog on this when my best friend stopped by and relating what I was up to he took a look and he got some of his tools to attack this bolt. First we attempted to drive on a slightly smaller metric throwaway socket with my 5 lb. mallet to drive it on but with a tiny shoulder of the head of that damm bolt we couldn't get enough bite.
I then tried my little Benomatic torch on it to see if I could free it up followed by failed attempt with a pair of needle nosed vice grips. We then tried some penetrating oil and let it set for a spell, then using the throwaway socket impacting the bolt with the mallet again to no avail.
It is very tight quearters in this part of the engine compartment despite the I6 being skinnier than the V8, the exhaust pipe is right in the way with no means of removing it due to other clearance issues.
We then checked to see if we could squeeze in a 4 inch grider to grind the head off of the bolt, but as you can see from the photos it's just too tight. My friend then broke out his Sawzall and with a new metal blade tried to get a bead on the bolt head but the throw of the blade kept throwing him off of his mark. So it was up to my Dremel tool with the kit of tiny 3/4 inch cutoff wheels. To get it even with the axis of the bolt head it took my friend on the top side (from the doghouse nacelle) and me working from underneath to manipulate the switch. We went through 4 cutoff wheels and another attempt with the Sawzall and we were very clse to the mounting flange, so we stopped to see if we could break the starter past what little there was left of the bolt head~it held fast. :-arrgh. Beating it with my 5 lb. mallet to release some frustration and to see if there was any deflection we found the starter was moving a tiny bit. Using the Dremel once again and the cutoff wheels carefully shaving off by the fraction of a millimeter what I thought were the remnants of the bolt head... still it held fast. Taking my mallet and adjusting my body position for better leverage a beat on the starter with all the force I could muster and finally it dropped on my chest with the bolt threads protruding thround the mounting flange on the bellhousing. I bumped it with the trouble light and my frined saw the bolt move a tiny bit~sure enough the bolt was free and now could be removed using my fingers.
you can bet we used a conventional 9/16 head bolt on that damm thing when we mounted up the new starter. Total time spent on this single bolt was 5 1/4 hours.
:-roll
At least I knew better than to use that damm 'Gator Grip' socket. Tried using it on a steeol pipe plug that was in my Edelbrock intake manifold years ago and it just rounded out the pipe plug head.
