Freeing sticky bolts: Share your tips

Ok. I can't change my brake pads, because the bolts to remove them are stuck!

It's been awhile since I tried, but IIRC, it's a hex bolt that is the culprit.

So anyone have some tips to share? All I've tried so far is WD-40. A friend suggested that the surefire way is to use an impact wrench, but I don't know anyone with an air compressor.

Should I try PB Blaster? A blowtorch? Spray it with WD-40 every other day for a couple weeks?

What works for you!?

 

You shouldn't use heat on parts that have rubber seals and/or trapped fluid in them.

Using a cheater bar and a hammer has been known to help. Sometimes trying to tighten the fastener first works as well.

Good Luck
Karazy

 

Take a hammer and rap the head of the bolt sharply one or two times. This will shock the threads and should break the bond of oxidation between the steel and aluminum.

 

PB Blaster plus the method described above, has yet to fail me.

 

Try AeroKroil. let it soak in has never failed me yet even when WD-40 has.
I have had to drill the bolts out and replace them, before after having the allen heads round off.
on my '86 VFR700

 

I somewhat agree about heating rubber or parts holding fluid. But sometimes I've sacrificied some surrounding pieces to save the main part, not for the faint of heart. But good Lord man don't set things on FIRE !!! Just make sure there is room for fluids to expand and watch for spitting brake fluid at the other end, otherwise there goes your paint. Use an industrial heat gun before a torch in most cases. A torch will provide a pin point flame/heated area where a heat gun heats more of the entire piece. Heat is always your friend. Sending shock waves through the part + penetrating oils also helps bigtime. One of the tricks my dad taught me when I was a kid is to wrap the bolt and constantly tap it sorta like a machine gun tapping to put some shock waves through the part. Yes the head of the bolt may expand and makes it difficult to get a 6 point socket on, sometime I had to file the hex by hand or us the next size larger socket. Good to have US, metric and even British sockets. A lot depends on where and how the offending part is mounted and located. I've tapped bolts, soaked parts for days, just move them the tiniest bit, wrap/tap some more, tighten them, back them off. Also drilled down the center of a bolt to the base metal and injected pen oil to the back side. Unluckily even with all the mentioned it may be unsucessful if the bolt is fused to the metal through chemical action & oxidation. Like what happens on boats. I still have a stainless bolt that has a least a full twist that came out of my boats lower unit. Hence Helicoils & drilling out the remains trying to catch that elusive thread that is only a coil after drilling and the multitude of thread repair options. To finish up do be careful w/Loctite with aluminum. I loctited some bolts many years ago in cast aluminum and when I had to remove the bolts every bolt took the threads with it, but that was a British cylinder head & some of there alloys are very soft. Enough for now. The Dad

 

An impact wrench set too high or on a smaller fastener is just asking to snap it off. Things I have done... penetrating oil such as Kroil or ATF and acetone (sometimes can take a while to soak in), heat, cold, beeswax, impact tools, tapping the wrench with a hammer, four foot pipe, and any combination or sequence of those.

 

Soak it with Kano Kroil for 24 hours then try it. If it doesn't loosen, (using a 6 POINT socket or wrench-NO 12 point!) hit it with a pinpoint flame from a propane torch (NOT red hot, just hot enough that you can't touch it), protecting the surrounding 'stuff' with wet rags under doubled up aluminum foil. Try loosening it again. If it STILL doesn't go, use a light weight (12 to 16 oz.) ball peen hammer, firm tapping (with the round face) in the middle face of the bolt head. Patience is the key. This works 99% of the time for me and I've been working on old stuff for a LONG time. Once it comes out, blow out the hole with some air, chase the threads with the correct tap, blow out again, good to go. Make sure the bolt is clean too before using it again.
IF this doesn't work and you have to drill it, use the biggest drill you can without risking hitting the threads, gives the EZE-OUT more purchase on the bolt, I've broken off small EZE OUTs in a stuck bolt-now you got a real problem.:thumbsup:

 

PB Blaster is my favorite. That stuff is gold. I just finished my 2nd 75 GL1000 resto and had many stuck bolts due to rust or corrosion.
If you dont know someone with a compresser and you wrench your own stuff i highly recommend getting one. DeWalt and Bocsh both make cordless impacts in large and small and they work quite well. I dont know what i'd do without my impact guns.
Good luck!

 

well as a heavy equipment mechanic i have found my self in many tough settings, sometimes try tightening the bolt slightly first before trying to losing it, you can use heat on the surface around the outside of the bolt but i wouldn't use heat near rubber or fluids ? also try smacking the bolt to shock the threads, some times try center punching the bolts and drilling a hole completely down the center of the bolt and using penetrates or easy out and clean up the threads afterwords with a tap ? don't just go and force it because that makes bolts brake, good luck

 

MOST rounded-off fasteners got that way by use of INFERIOR tools.

(Honda uses locktite on bolts that mount brake calipers, and they can be especially tight first time off.)

Don't use any cheap tools made in China or Taiwan on any machine ....except a lawnmower.

Always use 6 point sockets and box end wrenches instead of 12 point or open end spanners where possible, and never use tools from the factory toolkit unless you have no alternative.

 

Success!

Awesome! I just got them loose! But this is a pretty good thread, so keep the tips coming.

Details: It wasn't the 12mm caliper bolts that were the problem. It was the stinking brass(?) pins that go through the holes in the brake pads. They are recessed and take a 5mm hex wrench. The weird thing is that they 1. don't appear to require any torque at all to do their job and 2. they have a screw-in cover (err used to.. those things are easy to lose!) which would make it pretty darn difficult for them to back themselves out even if they weren't torqued at all. Since the bike had 32k miles when I bought it, I assume the last owner overtorqued them. (He had also bolted a hack cover over the bottom of the left fork to cover the left axle, as if he thought some original part was missing, so I'm now even more dubious of his mechanical IQ).

So I had tried very hard to remove these pins a few months ago. I went at it for 2 days with just WD-40 before finally giving up. I just continued to ride on the last bit of my pads. I had the plan to spray them regularly, but I neglected to follow through. So 3 months of nothing. Then last night, I sprayed them with WD-40, again. Then today, they came loose relatively easy.

So I guess I can add my own tip, now. Spray with WD-40 and let soak for 3 months!

 

PB Blaster is another "super penetrant" . I've never tried it BUT after following this thread I'm going to try some. Never to old to try something better. :biggrin:

 

Thumbs up on the AERO-KROIL ! We use that at work all the time and some of the bolts I'm trying to get have been done up for 70 to 80 years on steam lines, beeswax is another good one but only if you can apply heat first.

 

blowtorch and wd40 always a good decision:thumbsup:

 

"How can i tell that my tools are junk and likely to damage fasteners?"

Because they are not marked with any manufacturer's brand name you or anybody ever heard of .......or not marked at all !!

Most unmarked tools are from China, so beware of damages and breakages.

 

^^ Many tools that contain large amounts of steel and which require little precision machine work, whether big brand or not, are made in China. Some of the things made over there are of high quality. There's a lot of junk as well... but that's only because it gets the job done well enough that people keep buying it. Sure, you can spend 10 times more to buy Snap-On if you want, but a lot of people get by with Chinese manufactured tools and would never know the difference. I think most Stanley tools are made in China, now. That's the trend of things. American importers, American name... made in China, Croatia, Yugoslavia, or who knows where.

*I'm not saying Stanley tools, in particular, are top quality.

 

Really?? Just name 1 or 2

OK, i might sound severly prejudiced against foreign-made junk, but PLEASE name 1 or 2 of the "high quality" brands made in China......where low price, no quality control, and disposable are the keywords.



HOw many here have bought cheap "Harbor Freight" shit and had it break after 2 or 3 uses?????????

 

That stuff kicks butt and saved my rear on many occasions. Works great. Go to a aircraft supply place if ya can't find it anywhere.

Liquid Wrench has worked for me on some occasions too. Water Displacement 40th formula (WD40) is for minor sticks IMO.