theprf

Cannot access the other end of the bolt from under the car. It's bolted to the seat base frame, a weldment that is then attached to the floor.

sanyata

Would a soldering iron tip provide enough heat?

allcool

Have you tried tig welding a large nut to whats left..?

hbdunn

This is the only way to get it out at this point. I would not drill it if it were me. Sounds like with the slot cut in it that would be difficult anyway.

Is there a reason you haven't taken it to someone with a welder?

Ben8jam

Cause I thought with all the suggestions I could get it out. I have a friend with a welder who DIYs on cars, so I'm going to call him. Or go find a shop... can't believe how much effort this has taken.

Dr_Strangelove

Yes - you didn't let the JB cure. This trick will work - I used it myself to get a rounded drain pan plug out. When you goop up the JB - expect the cure time to take longer because the JB is piled up and the stuff in the center will remain softer, longer. It's meant to be applied as if you're welding something together in small patches. JB weld your socket on and let it sit all week and then try next weekend. Make sure that MFer is dry.

jdbornem

My personal 2-cents is that I would be surprised if JB weld works. It is hard, and bonds strongly, but it is brittle. If you've ever stressed JB to failure, it cracks through and sheers off. The bond is stronger than the internal structure of the JB weld.

But I hope, for you, that I'm wrong. Good luck!
I think Welding is in your future.

Ben8jam

My friend with the welder said he'd be potentially worried about catching the surrounding carpet on fire or damaging the back of the drivers seat. I get his concerns, don't want to mess up someone's interior as a favor.

De Jeeper

That should be a real concern for a mig welder. A tig welder is a lot more controlable and should not splatter. I would still cover just about eveything in wet towels.

allcool

As with all welding jobs, take precautions to protect surrounding areas...

If you're worried,,, I'd wrap a wet towel or 2 around the carpet/seat/etc, in question, and maybe have a helper hold or place a piece of sheet metal as a shield if needed.

But for an experienced welder its a fast job to fill up the nut with good penetration at the base of the nut/bolt.... Maybe don't let the bolt cool all the way before fitting a tight socket on the nut squarely applying torque...

jmo

allcool

You beat me to it DJ...lol

scissorfighter

Well @Ben8jam , I don’t envy you. I do wish you the best of luck though. Just chiming in to say this is my favorite thread on rennlist in a while. It’s a great team effort on a difficult adventure with an as-yet-to-be-revealed mystery ending! Keep going, you can do it!

Gary12000

well id say the car is totaled lol i kid i kid, worst case you put the seat in with what you have it will likley never make a difference, but i know when i found my seat bolt that was pretty marred from the indy shop that just had it out, i was like oh crap, they likely put them in with a 3/8inch impact to tighten them, i dont know that but it was in pretty common use make in the day when i worked at a pontiac dealer, i think they had what was called a butterfly impact back then for the shape of it, they for sure would have used a 3/8 air wrench back in the day, these days its all battery tools.. but to be fair from the factory and after 25 years or so, they are likely properly tight.

OK so with my worst personal vehichle nightmare this is what happened I had a Yamaha Star Stratoliner... and changed mirrors to after market, they were red loctite installed but i didn't know this, i snapped the second one off clean.. hmmmm drilled out the center and snapped off an easy out, re-drilled slightly off center second easy out, used heat cycles and it finally came out after many heat cycles... unfortunately i had damaged some of the threads on one side but i had enough good material left to install the new mirror with Blue loctitie what a fricken nightmare i had and of course you are in the middle of one as i write.

If you resort to drilling out what remains of the bolt there are a few things to be aware of, get a proper center punch and hit a pilot spot as perfectly center of the stud as you are able, use a very small drill at first a 16th or an eighth of an inch, just to get things started and in the center, before you move up in size you may have an opportunity to re-center with the next biggest drill, the actual drilling does produce a good amount of heat that in itself my help with the thread corrosion for want of a better word.. use lube and lots of it.. regular 3m oil or engine oil keep applying during the drilling process it will stop you bit from going blunt. NOTE: if the bolt itself is of a hardened material you may need a special drill bit to successfully drill the bolt material out. NOTE 2: make sure you drill straight or you will blow out the side and damage the threads. watch lots of you tube videos before you get started for tips...

I hope you try the weld method first a decent independent mechanic or machine shop could probably weld on a new bolt head in the form of a nut in less than 15 mins..

firewalkwithme

What did you end up doing to solve this?

Ben8jam

Very funny timing. I literally just got back from my indy mechanic who out of niceness tried to extract it for me using his much stronger extraction sockets and a hammer. No go. It just kept breaking bits of the bolt head off.

He said he would use a grinder (he showed me some very nice grinder bits), get the head off. Take the seat and rail out. Then drill down into the bolt and remove it. He said if he wanted me to do it, I would have to drop car off for that, which is totally fair. It was really nice of him to stop what he was doing and even try.

So I think i will look into a grinder and try and do that. I have to admit, I stupid didn't even think that once the bold head was off, I could remove the entire seat and have a lot more room to work with.