Brake Rotor Bolts - stripped the hex head

[SteelerBike]

My maxes bolts are rusted so I ordered new ones from the dealership.

I borrowed my buddies impact wrench and got all but 3 bolts off. I stripped them.

I'm thinking I should use a metal drill bit and drill out the center of the bolts and then use a needle nose plyer to grab the remaining bolt and twist it out.

Anyone have success with such an application?

Am I "Screwed"??

 

[Mitchell]

My 07 had 3 rotor bolts strip out on me as well. Those stock bolts are soft crap. What I did to get them out was use a small propane torch and heated the head of the bolt to loosen the thread lock. Once its good and warm, grab it tight with a "good" pair of vice grips and they should trun right off. Good Luck!

 

[Jdk203]

before you do that you could try another trick. I've removed a lot of stripped/stuck bolts in my day. I would first make a special allen key. What you wanna do is cut the L to an l shape and taper one of the ends so that it fits in the botl, keeping the hex shape while tapering it. Then grab ahold of it down near the taper with a pair of vise grips (really really tight) Using a small ball pein hammer lightly tap the back side of you allen l and try loosening with the vice grips. Always keep tapping while turning. This will help keep the tool tight in the hex and will help work the bolt loose. I find that this method works 9 times out of 10. Hopefully your bolts aren't too far gone for this. If so I guess your method is next. If your gonna drill I would recommend trying your best to start in the center and stay in the center of the bolt. If you drill down through the whole thing with a small drill bit a lot of times that will relieve them enough that they become loose. Also if you have access to left hand drill bits they can work wonders. Good luck!

 

[gamorg02]

i easy-outed mine.

 

[SteelerBike]

i easy-outed mine.

???what does that mean???

 

[one2dmax]

We also use an "easy out" also known as a bolt extractor. I took a spare and ground the tip off to get good full contact. I've removed a few hundred of these (easily that many) and found the easiest way is to use a manual impact driver to loosen the bolts a few full turns then they can be impacted off.

Heating the bolt up should also work quite well and a punch can swell the allen hole back closed to help try and keep using the allen bit to take it out.

Sean

 

[Heretic]

Yeah, these bolts Suck! I got all of mine except for one, but they all got marrred when removing them. Anyone know of an aftermarket, or stronger alternative to the factory bolts that I can use?

 

[95spfldmax]

I must have lucked out. (that don't happen too often) I just took mine out on my '95 last weekend without any drama.

 

[KJShover]

My maxes bolts are rusted so I ordered new ones from the dealership.

I borrowed my buddies impact wrench and got all but 3 bolts off. I stripped them.

I'm thinking I should use a metal drill bit and drill out the center of the bolts and then use a needle nose plyer to grab the remaining bolt and twist it out.

Anyone have success with such an application?

Am I "Screwed"??

1 of mine stripped out while removing the rear rotor and installing the new wavy. I grabbed my trusty vise-grips and clamped down on the allen head then broke it loose.

My vise grip set has saved me hundreds of times on stripped bolts and screws providing I could clamp on to the head of the offending bolt/screw.

 

[1967vmax]

I used my die grinder and cut a slot, then used a large straight screwdriver. Jim

 

[EvilD]

Heat them up and get a left handed drill bit, i've found on other things that the left handed drill will usully catch and walk bolts out, if it doesn't you have a good hole to put an easy out in

 

[dannymax]

I tried replacing the oem **** bolts with S/S ones, but found they are not a hell of a lot better. Has anyone tried titanium?

 

[sdt354]

I get a lot of stripped allen head bolts at work. The first thing I try before drilling is to find a torx bit (impact bit if possible)just a little bigger that fits tight in the stripped hole. Drive it in, they bite good. Then back it out or hand impact it out. Good luck.
Steve-o

 

[Mitchell]

As several have stated. Heat and vice grips work wonders. Good luck!