Don't bother to tell me what a dumb *** I am for using stainless bolts, or for not using anti-seize since I have already had a long discussion with myself about it. Here's the deal, boxed frame with no way to get at the nut. Stainless bolt broken below top of rail. Is there any trade secret or sneaky way to get this thing out besides drilling it?
If you can get to it with a center drill try that. It will give you a god starter hole for a drill bit. Is it something that you could drill out and then go to the next size bigger incase the threads get boogered? Good Luck.
grind down, bondo over the mess, and move whatever it was you're trying to mount to a fresh place in the frame! or use a hole saw that's about as big as the outside dimension of the nut, and drill out the mess and weld in a new nut. (these are last resort methods if the drilling tips the other guys give you don't pan out)
I hate stainless hardware for exactly that reason. When you least expect it the threads will gaul themselves and you're hooped. I'll bet drilling a starter hole and trying to use an "easyout" won't work. It sounds crude but I would use a torch or plasma cutter to blow the remnants of the bolt out. I've had good success with this technique and I haven't wrecked the threads. Dissimilar metals tend to peel away from each other. Just clean them up with a tap. The only down side is that you'll have shrapnel rattling it your frame for all enternity. Solve that with louder exhaust.
the torch trick works because the frame dissipates the heat, so the threads in it can't stay hot enough to burn, while the bolt fragment just keeps getting hotter. I wish I'd remembered to suggest it...thanks
weld a nut to the broken bolt with a mig welder. let it cool completly..it may take several attempts but it will get it out. the thermal shock wil break the electrolysis bond. use a nut one size bigger than the bolt, weld thru the center.. fill the nut up completly with weld. let it cool.. gently twist the nut. if the weld fails , try again. i have used this on everything from 1/4" in aluminum heads to 3/4" in cast iron.. never failed yet..be patient.. good luck dave
My friend has a business that removes broken taps, bolts, etc. He uses and electron drill that disintegrates the middle of the broken peice and then he "picks" out the rest. He has bailed me out more than once.
I think you are faced with drilling it out and putting in a heli-coil. At least no heat or welding and you can do it without moving the frame.
that works on a rusted fastener, but doesn't work on a seized stainless bolt. the stainless galled, practically welded itself in there, and the balls of galled stainless jammed in the threads lock it in there GOOD. maybe a good torch jockey could make the torch trick work, but i've tried cutting stainless with the torch and had zero luck.
Not sure how it would work with a stainless bolt, but if you drill it out with a left handed drill and the drill motor in reverse a lot of times the bolt will spin out. You can buy left handed drills at MSC, but it's easy to grind your own. Center drill for a pilot hole and go from there. A broken off tip center drill works great as a spot drill or for starting a pilot hole in a broken bolt. Grind the tip to a V - all you're doing is making a sharp pointed drill and not revamping any of the original flutes etc. I would do this before I took a chance on a center drill breaking off it's pilot tip in the bolt - which is a common occurence when hand drilling. If the bolt is stuck in a non-blind hole a lot of times when drilling them out right handed the bolt will screw itself to the other end and drop out. Sometimes you get lucky.
Well the plasma did the trick. Thanks for the moral support and after being bitten for the second time by stainless steel bolts, kick my *** if I ever do this again.
Stainless hardware ****S, don't ever use it. I have to at work, food industry and I hate it. ALWAYS use never-seize if you insist on useing it anyway. I've had to use a wrench on bolts I spun a nut on by hand. It ****S.
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