Christopher28

I was snooping around under my right wheel well and notice that my drop-link was broken off - the link itself, (the bar), and it's been busted for months because the shorn-off ends were rusty. (I bought this car about two months ago) (It was inspected in December) (They missed/ignored a boatload of stuff) Anyway, the nut came off easily, on the big through-bolt, but I CANNOT get the bolt out. I hammered on the end of it about 150 times - maybe more. Plenty of liquid wretch, some WD-40, a heavy helping of swear words...I hammered on the BOOT end, hammered SIDEWAYS, top, bottom.... the END of the bolt is now flattened, considerably.... NOTHING! WTF? How do I get this thing out? (I don't have an oxy-acetylene torch) It's SUPPOSED to slide out, isn't it? There's no way to unscrew it... Thanks.

dporto

Ha! Yes, it's supposed to slide out. The problem is dissimilar metals (steel bolt through aluminum) which when they oxidize they sort of "weld" themselves together. In my case, I got the bolt to turn long before I got it to come out of the carrier. It took me close to a week of hammering, heating, solvents (a bunch of different ones) etc... and that was with the wheel carrier off the car. If you can remove the wheel carrier it will be easier. Be careful with the heat on the aluminum - it doesn't take much - if you can use a heat gun instead of a torch that's good. My best advice is to just take your time - you don't want to bend the bolt. If worse comes to worse you can always cut the flattened end of the bolt off so you can get a nut back on it. You shouldn't be hammering directly on the end of the bolt either - use a large pin punch. Good luck

808Bill

Can you cut the mushroom off and get two bolts on it? If so you may be able to get it to turn and break loose. If not you may have to drill it out. Got a pic?

dporto

As I said above, it'll turn long before it comes out. It's a "shoulder bolt" so there are no threads where it passes through the wheel carrier (or very few at least)...

808Bill

Got it. Not looking forward to going through this!

Imo000

Put some heat to it. Even if it's just propane. Aluminium expands a lot with minimal heat.

Christopher28

won't be able to take a picture for a couple days, probably. I'm not sure what you mean by "two bolts" on it. Is Liquid wrench the best solvent/loosener?

808Bill

Azraely

I've copied a post from a thread I made last summer dealing with the exact same issue.

I applied heat for 30 seconds on the bolt, then hit it with the hammer, after doing that for about 15 minutes the bolt came away from the face on the other side by a fraction of a mm. So at least I knew it was moving. Rinse repeat for the next hour or so and I had moved the bolt about half an inch. The problem then was I ran out of bolt protruding through the carrier so my hammer strikes were mostly hitting the wheel carrier. I then tried to use a punch but the length of it and holding it made it impossible to get any decent force onto the bolt.

The trick was to drill the end of the bolt with say an 1/8 inch bit, maybe an 1/8 inch deep, just enough to fit the chisel point of my air hammer. This allowed me to get the air hammer directly in line with the bolt without it slipping off. Once I had this setup the bolt was out in 5 seconds.

So for those who experience a stuck drop link that won't budge using the conventional non destructive ways, I'd definitely start with drilling the bolt end and trying the air hammer with a chisel point.

Christopher28

will try .... thanks

USNA1970

Dremel

sweet victory

Heat n beat.

During reinstall, you'll definitely want to use some antiseize on the shank of the drop link bolt.