Welcome to the first of many how-to's. One thing I've seen so many times is inexperienced, or internet experienced kids working on there Honda's who just don't know the basics. They can swap a engine, throw in some cams, but when it comes to just using a hand tool they tend to get a little carried away with stupidity.


When you don't take care of your chassis, suspension system, etc things tend to get rusted, dirty and stuck. When you come across a bolt that doesn't want to turn the logical, yet stupid thing to do is try harder. The problem is we don't think down the line to spending 2 hours fixing the broken bolt welded into your car after you tried harder.

So the most common thing to do is spray some wd40, pb blaster, and heat the bolt up. All is good, except sometimes people get carried away with this as well and end up creating more problems down the line. Any component shouldn't be heated up past 300 degree's, so heat isn't really a good method. Esp on a sub frame, or suspension component, the hotter it gets the less integrity it keeps, and could deform as well.

First method.
A bolt is seized or stuck due to rust, and elements getting in the threads, or a unclean bolt/thread to begin with. So we must set things in motion and create some vibration.
Yet before we even start hitting that bolt we need to remove as much rust as we can. Rust is the enemy and should not just be simply looked over. Take a wire brush and remove all of it you can, use some liquid wrench to help. With the rust off, and the bolt soaking in liquid wrench begin lightly tapping the bolt for a minute. Were not hitting or slamming the bolt. Then after you soak the bolt again, give it one good whack. If this does not work, we move to method two.

Second Method.
After the failure of the first method we must spend more time freeing up space for pb blaster or liquid wrench to do its job. So back to the hammer we go. Take a flat head and hit each flat spot of the bolt head at each angle. The more the better, while soaking it. After a few minutes of this, give the head anther good whack and turn.

Third Method.
All as failed, life is over. You have failed to take care of your car, and this is what happens. Now you must replace the bolt, cause were going to weaken the bolt, and use a mixture of hot and cold. Take a torch and heat the stud up till it is visibly heated. Then spray/pour ice cold water on it. Make sure you remove all the pb blaster and such as they tend to get in the way. Steam is going to do the work.

If none of this works, you can also weld on a nut/bolt, use a silly big breaker bar,
impact wrench etc, in most cases this will just break the head off.

thank you.

 

 

 

Great advice

 

Will a small propane torch work for heating the bolt up?

 

yea, just make sure you clear out any rust first,
and watch out for any rubber, or hard lines(brake, gas, etc)

 

good advice for a weekend warrior, but a flat rate tech would have blue tip wrenched it off and replaced the lower control arm bushing, shock and gotten paid for it.

sorry had to go there