Thursday, April 25, 2013

Last night, the fuel tank and lines came out.  The starter button came out, and I disconnected the accelerator pedal. (I'll remove the pedal from the tub *after* the tub is off.)  The only things going through the tub now are the gear shifts.   Looking at those, I either needed to pull the rings holding the boots down (8 screws), or the floor panel (I don't think that exists in an original tub) with around 20 bolts.  Unfortunately, I could only get 7 of the 8 screws out.  So I moved to the panel, and got all but one of the bolts out.  Off to Princess Auto today for some extraction tools.  (I have some--and they did help for some of the bolts, but the remaining one needs something different.)  If extraction doesn't work, I'll just grind the head off.

The more I look at this tub, the more my original idea of getting a whole new replacement tub looks like a good idea.  This thing is rotten almost everywhere!  A new tub is expensive, but it'll take probably hundreds of hours and skills I don't have (yet), not to mention patience I'm not likely to ever have, to do any kind of semi-decent restoration of the tub.  If it was original, I'd probably make the effort to at least try.  But it's not, so I probably won't.


2 comments:

Wade Bortz said...

Hey, I never had much luck with those screw extractors, but a set of reverse twist drill bits has worked for me many times. If it's a bigger bolt that's sheared off and stuck, I've drilled a hole down it, pounded in a 1/4 inch phillips bit, and then used a 1/4 " wrench to turn it out. The crankshaft bolt on my old Hawaiian Mitsubishi ute took 3 days, a broken hand, and a wrench twisted into a spiral, but it eventually came out. Lots of penetrating oil and leaving it for tomorrow helps too.

Paul S. said...

Yeah, I've never had luck with them either. And I can't tell you how many drill bits I've broken trying to drill the holes for them. I've wanted to try reverse twist bits, but I haven't found any yet.

As for the bolt in question--when all else failed, I ground the head off! Leaving the bottom behind wasn't a problem in this case.

Actually, I discovered another use for a nut splitter last night. One of the nuts holding the tub down wouldn't hold a socket or wrench, and the harder I tried, the worse it got. So I decided to use a nut splitter on it. But once I got the splitter firmly engaged, I realized that that would hold the nut nicely. Since it was in a confined area, the splitter couldn't spin. So I put the socket back on the bolt and unscrewed it successfully!

BTW, I recently saw a study that showed that the best penetrating oil (at least for loosening rusted fasteners) is a 50/50 mix of acetone and ATF. Haven't tried it yet, but I'm sure I will on this project at some point. Everything I've done so far is somewhere I don't give a darn if the bolt broke off (and I've sheared a bunch).

But you broke your hand!? And went right back to finish the job within three days!?