Hondaaaaa

Ok, so here's the thing.
I was taking off all 3 belts on my 98 Civic HX. I took off the alternator and powersteering belts without any problems. But then came the A/C Belt. After I took it off, I noticed that it looped around the lower engine stabilizer/ mount (whatever it is), and that the only way to get the belt off was to remove the mount (or the entire a/c compressor and bracket). There are 2 bolts for the mount, that go upward through the u-shaped mount bracket and into the frame. They were rusty as hell, so I had to use a lot of force, but at first they were coming out just fine. Then all of a sudden I felt something snap, and the bolt just kept spinning. I tried the other side, and the same thing happened. Now you cannot tighten or loosen the bolts, just spin em around.

Inside the frame, I believe there is a nut (you can't see anything from the outside) that grabs onto each bolt. There must be some metal lip or something that holds the nut in place, and I assume I broke that lip, so that now the bolt and nut just spin freely.
Has anyone encountered this before? Will I have to cut a hole in the frame to fix it? Can a shop even do this, or will they tell me to buy a new car lmao?

Thanks in advance,
- Ian

shoklid

sounds like the "lip" ur talking about should be a weld. and ive have many welds break on nuts like that. ull prob have to cut off the bolt and replace it. can u get to the nut side? im not sure where these bolts are ur talking about. i mean if it was welded on before there should be not much of a prob getting it fixed. i wouldnt buy a new car over it. and if its just the a/c just dont put it back on. hope this helps a lil bit.

1nsoman1ac

or you can do what i did when i bought a full aluminum radiator meant for a 94 integra and put it in my civic cx. i had to relocate one of the stock radiator mounts. simply drilled right through the chassis and drove 2 2.5 inch grade 8 bolts with locking nuts. worked liek a charm, easy as hell to do, and you cant even see it.

hope that helps

NH538DB8

I'm kinda in the same boat, I did the same thing to one of the bolts on the tranny side torque mount. Haven't fixed it yet because I'm not sure I want to go through the trouble of doing so, If I do I'll probably have to drop the trans, cut a hole in the frame rail, clean the inside of the rail, maybe replace the nut, weld it back together, spray some rustoleom in there and then weld the frame rail back up and reinforce the section that I cut out.

It really makes me wonder if I should invest any money into a car that is really getting toward the end of its life in the sense that the body is starting to rust and it goes a lot deeper than just the regular quarter panel stuff (which is fixed up btw).

08zx14

when i swapped my engine this happened to me with my torque mount on the same side as yours, i ended up cutting the bolts off and had my friend weld the mount back to the frame. now i dont have ac though so if you did this you would have to keep in mind that you would prob have to take off your ac comp to change the belt again.

heritage36

Yeah, that mount isn't all that important, on probably 95% of the Hondas I ever touch which is many, that mount is torn apart anyways and not actually stabilizing anything. That happened to me on my del sol too when I was replacing the accessory belts. What you have to do it cut a area out of the frame part to put a new nut on that side to put the bolts into. Its a pain, and not really worth it IMO.

Hondaaaaa

Thanks for all of the good advice guys. I guess I'm going to have to cut a hole in the frame to get to the nuts.
*Would you all recommend using a hole saw to do the trick?*

My only fear about welding the mount to the frame is that i'll never be able to take it off again, so I would have to cut it off or something if I'd ever need to take the engine out.

v8killaz

i say cut the old bolts off, drill holes
and just thread in some expanding screws in their
the big ones that get bigger

or some self tappers

gsr96cx

Or do what i did, I drilled two holes on each side of the frame from the wheel well side right by where the blot would be located, so I can see the nut that was suppose to be welded on, inside the frame. Once I have drilled the holes I used a boxed end wrench to hold the nut inside the frame inplace while I loosen the bolt up. Now if I ever wanted to I can replace the mount which I ended up having to 2 weeks ago. I used a unibit to drill through the frame. Just make sure you spray the holes you drilled with some primer, or paint to cover up the exposed frame metal. I drilled this two years ago, and thought it would begin to rust but as of now its fine.