I need to get a bolt off my car which can only be undone from the top, but has siezed, and no amount of plus gas/wd40 seems to be able to penetrate. I can't get a socket on to it becuase there is no room, I can only just get a ring spanner on it but do not have enough leverage to move it... any suggestions? can't get nut splitters in there either, or anything that could cut it off. I have a replacement bolt so distroying it is an option but how?
How do you?
- Thread starter Alex
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How do you?
OK, first try hitting the bolt hard with a hammer, use a lenghth of something metal to reach the head of the bolt if your tight for space. Also, sometimes it works if you first tighten the bolt, I know it sounds silly but it has worked many times. Doubt a pneumatic one will do the job...
Good old extreme leverage required here but the bolt shouldn't be that inaccessable, can't you remove more parts to ease access rather than struggling?
Liam
Liam
The other option is to get a drill and drill it out but id go for that as a last resort!
The drilling isn't a bad idea. But bolts and nuts are much tougher than body-steel. When we destroyed a bolt in the rear hub on the Ritmo Abarth we drilled to destroy the bolt. This got it so hot (expands) it actually loosened itself. So: use a blowtorch! If you don't destroy any bushes etc. Anyway - try to heat it somewhat.
Morten.
Morten.
when i took my car to get tracked yesterday, the guy couldnt shift a bolt after WD 40 and rust penertrator, he used a blow torch on it, a bit extreme for my liking but it soon shifted the nut
If the bolt is in a depression that will hold liquid try Coca Cola. It may be apocryphal, but over the years I've heard many people talk about how good Coke is at this sort of thing. I suspect it's acidic and works its way in and frees things up.
Legend had it if you left an old penny in a glass of Coke it would disappear overnight.
Legend had it if you left an old penny in a glass of Coke it would disappear overnight.
About the coke. My father-in-law was a chef on a ship many years ago, maybe 40!, and he could tell they cargoe'd coca cola essence for the breweries abroad. It was jet black on small glass containers and had a pirate flag symbol on them... the skull and two knuckles - poison. So acid, yes.
Morten.
Morten.
Thanks for the help, I have tried many of the above, but nothing worked, so I used the rather crude method of attaching the spanner to the bolt and putting some short scaffolding pole over the other end of the spanner to gain leverage, and it came free with a large crack.
Scaffy poles, ever so versatile. We use them as hammers, pipes, supports - oh, and scaffolding too sometimes 
Sometimes it's all down to brutal force!
