Removing extremely tight cut off bolts

[Welder Dave]

I finally got around to wanting to put a sprocket counterweight back on my track loader. I need to make bigger backup washers because the sprocket isn't OEM with the mounting holes. Someone before me cut bigger holes in the sprocket.

One bolt was still in but the other two I cut of with a torch. The weight was about to fall off. I had to heat up the head off the bolt red hot and then really beat on an 1 1/8" wrench. Had to keep pounding till I got about 2 full turns then thankfully my electric impact turned it out the rest of the way.

After seeing how tight the first bolt was I knew I'd need to do some serious pounding on the other two. I had a piece of 2" angle iron I cut in half and torched holes to fit over the cut off 3/4" bolts. I welded 3/4 of the way around the first bolt before blowing a hole. I thought it would be enough but it broke after 2 hits. I turned the heat down and fully welded both bolts with 7018. I had to pound like hell with a long handle sledge to get them to loosen but got them out. The smaller hammer was enough ounce they were loose a few turns. I had to take a couple breaks because bending over to swing the hammer was killing my back. What an ordeal. Glad there was only 3 bolts. I ran a tap in the holes and it was hard to turn in the bottom.

 

[Old Doug]

Kind of funny but i had a replace some truck cab mounts were i had to cut the open end off a 1 1/8 wrench to get them apart this week . Then yesterday i had to use a air chisel on the nuts of another deal to get it apart. I had to cut the open end off the wrench to put a cheater pipe on it .

 

[HarleyHappy]

When it comes to stuck bolts, there is no magic recipe.
Some things work better than others.
I just ordered 2 cans of Knocker Loose.
BFH on head, welding nuts, induction gun, chisel, left handed drill bits, easy outs. The list could go on forever, the important thing is, that they come out.
Usually, it’s a fight but occasionally the sun will shine and things go easy.

 

[Old Doug]

One REALLY BAD deal this week long story is i couldn't have my pickup that has different tools in it at work . Having every thing you need really helps.

 

[Tyler d4c]

I wander if the bolts where abit long and down in to where the threads wherent cut

 

[HarleyHappy]

If the holes were a bit too big, just the rotary action of going around and around, being loose, could have screwed them up royally.

 

[Welder Dave]

The bolts weren't too long but I think I put blue Loctite on them when I put the weights on after welding new sprocket rims on. Left side stayed tight but the right came loose. Blue Loctite shouldn't be hard to remove. The bigger custom washers I'm going to make will prevent the weights from falling off if the weight shifts. I don't think the weight will move though because the wider washers will grab more of the sprocket hub. The old washers were barely big enough to cover the holes.

 

[Deere500a]

Longer pipe more syrup more mousehead or heat try heat blue loctite melts low

 

[Welder Dave]

Blue Loctite doesn't usually require heat to remove. I thought about welding big nuts on the bolt studs but I would have had to pound on a wrench anyway. The weights are 300lbs. and there's no way to hold them. They'd just turn on the ground.

 

[Deere500a]

Dave no response I could hop your crawler on to your dump or cooler of beer I could have drove it to new york it's 300lbs lift bucket so it can't spin

 

[Welder Dave]

Your reply doesn't make much sense.

It's not exactly easy to move the weight around in a shop with a dirt floor. You can't roll it. Too hard and heavy to pick up and even trying to drag it with a tie down strap is too hard for my old aching body.

As far as my track loader it wouldn't fit on my dump truck. Even if it did you need to have ramps or mounds of dirt in place to load and unload it.

 

[Deere500a]

Dave relax

 

[Welder Dave]

I'm fine other than aching. You seem a little scattered though.

 

[LCA078]

A bit late to the game here but impact drivers are pretty good at loosening bolts vs a wrench and long cheater. I think my success with impacts guns/drivers is by alternating the direction every couple seconds to force the threads in both directions instead of just one direction. And an impact gun shouldn't spin the weights like a long wrench would. I know you're working with an electric impact but for these situations, size matters so not sure how much torque/impact your gun is giving.

But either you slice it, working with broken bolts, stripped heads, snapped studs, etc. will be a physical, moral, and sometimes spiritual event....and not in a good way.

 

[Welder Dave]

I think I used blue Loctite on the bolts so they shouldn't have been so hard to remove. My impact wrench isn't very powerful. I think about 240 ft./lbs. It was still nice after I got the one intact bolt turning. A high torque 1/2" or 3/4" might have got the other two out if I welded nuts to them but I had to use what I had. A bigger hammer would have helped except swinging a bigger hammer would have me aching even more.

 

[LCA078]

A bigger hammer would have helped except swinging a bigger hammer would have me aching even more.

Yeah, I hear ya on swinging the BFH becomes pretty hard on one's body after reaching a certain point in life. Same thing with big wrenches, cheater bars, pry bars, etc. Now I do my best to find easier but effective solutions instead of just brute force like I did back in my young and dumb days...

On a side note, like most of us, I grew up with corded tools and was pretty dubious of battery powered tools. But in the last decade or so, battery powered tools have become impressive. I picked up a DeWalt 1/2" impact gun about 5 years ago so it "only" has about 650ft/lbs torque. I think the newer ones are easily over a 1,000ft/lbs now and probably closer to 1,500 or more actually. It's amazing how easy it is to break loose nuts on big trucks/big equipment with these new cordless impacts. I even picked up a mid-range 3/8" DeWalt that is rated for 300-450ft/lbs that easily does 95% of what I need around the shop or on the road...and it's fairly lightweight. I'd say my cordless drill and impact gun have made working on equipment a lot less frustrating and painful in the past few years.

Anyway, I'm not advocating you buy a new impact gun but if you do, you probably won't be disappointed.

 

[Welder Dave]

I don't understand how they can make cordless have so much torque but with corded electric it's not anywhere close. It would be nice to have one but I don't need one enough to justify the cost. I rented a 1" Milwaukee and it had 1400 Ft./Lbs. loosening torque and I think about 1100 tightening. I had to tighten some 1 1/4" grade 8 bolts.

 

[LCA078]

I've always wondered how an impact worked also and stumbled upon this video a couple years that's pretty educational.

He also has a channel where he does a pretty good, scientific testing of various impacts over the years, along with other types of tools. I have no affiliation with him but I did use his videos to make informed purchases on my impacts like this one:

My wife will make fun of me because I'll watch videos like these or surf HEF. She'll walk by my desk and say snarkily "Well, at least you're watching this instead of bouncy girls on trampolines or such..."

And I don't know if that's a good thing or bad thing in her mind

 

[Welder Dave]

The Man Show with the jiggy girls on the trampoline was a great show!