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I am about to start removing the front and rear wings. I have been soaking the screw headed bolts, under the wing with WD40 every day for the past week. Unfortunately I cannot shift the bolts even with and impact screw driver. Short of drilling them out or grinding the heads off has any one any tips?

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You need to use a better penetrant for one and get it into the captive nuts under the wings and wait a bit longer. You may need some heat as well but in the end its often easier to grind the heads off and or drill them out.

Stuart.

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13 minutes ago, Phil Read said:

I am about to start removing the front and rear wings. I have been soaking the screw headed bolts, under the wing with WD40 every day for the past week. Unfortunately I cannot shift the bolts even with and impact screw driver. Short of drilling them out or grinding the heads off has any one any tips?

Hi Phil,

out of curiosity how far do you think you can throw a tin of WD40 down your garden:). Give it a go and then leave it there.:P

PlusGas and Freeway are very good penetrating fluids.

However your screws and captive nuts have been welded together by rust. Unless you can break the rust bond then drill out looks like the last solution.

 

I do use WD40 to help undo screws/nuts etc that are stiff but not frozen in place. It works as a reasonable temporary lubricant.   But it is a wonder fluid.

 

Roger 

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On my car the bolts and nuts were irreversibly welded together with rust. You could soak them until doomsday and nothing was going to free them. Not just the rust but the feeble cages allowing the nuts to rotate is working against you.

I ground off the heads, then pried the remains out of the cage. For the door hinge screws I drilled them out. I was able to free a few of them in the vice with some heat. It is worth salvaging as many square nuts as you can as the repro ones are a little undersized. If you dont care about originality there are modern UNF cage nuts that are much better made. My biggest harvest of square nuts was from the floors where they had been soaked in oil for 50 years.

Stan

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13 hours ago, RoyM said:

This will upset you all, Austin Healeys yes i said Austin Healeys have much better ways of making trap nuts, they are welded to the panels, way better than cage nuts, they darn well don't spin in the cage when trying to undo a rusty one.

Yes but having restored a lot of them theyre no easier to take apart after fifty plus years! plus with the steel to ally electrolytic reaction between wings and shrouds you dont often have to bother undoing them as they just pull off in a cloud of ally dust :lol:

Stuart.

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5 minutes ago, Phil Read said:

Sounds as though I am going to have fun. When refitting wings is it possible to just use nuts and bolts or screws and spire clips as on the TR6? I am not doing a concours job.

 

No because you cant get to half of them from behind very easily, you may as well do it properly first as last.

Stuart.

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On 4/23/2020 at 9:45 AM, stuart said:

Yes but having restored a lot of them theyre no easier to take apart after fifty plus years! plus with the steel to ally electrolytic reaction between wings and shrouds you dont often have to bother undoing them as they just pull off in a cloud of ally dust :lol:

Stuart.

.

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6 hours ago, stuart said:

No because you cant get to half of them from behind very easily, you may as well do it properly first as last.

Stuart.

But what about spire clips Attached to the wing edge instead of captive nuts? You could then use flathead screws which would look like the original. Land Rover used them to replace the captive nut idea.

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9 minutes ago, Phil Read said:

But what about spire clips Attached to the wing edge instead of captive nuts? You could then use flathead screws which would look like the original. Land Rover used them to replace the captive nut idea.

Trouble is the panels wouldnt sit flat edge to edge then.

Stuart.

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