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Re: Throttle Body Hell



At 3:08 AM -0400 8/31/97, SHAWN C MEZE wrote:
>On Sat, 30 Aug 1997 21:52:40 -0700 (PDT) Brad Sheridan
><brads@mindspring.com> writes:
>
>>  Has anybody ever had those four bolts come off easily the first
>>time?
>
>
>Several times. I don't understand the delima you kids are having.........
> Heh-heh!!!!
>
>Shawn Meze

I'd be interested to hear where the original poster is from.  I'm
originally from Boston, where bolts become one with nuts, stripped/frozen
fasteners are an expected part of working on the car.  I'd imagine the
Pacific Northwest is the same.  Now I live in Colorado, I understand why
the magazines would write about some jobs as trivial tasks - "unbolt the
shackle and remove."  Shackles (on Jeeps) need a whole lot more than
unbolting in Massachusetts.  Colorado is snowy in the winter, but no salt
is used - I occasionally encounter a frozen bolt, but it is rare, and often
on a car which is from a saltier part of the world.  My current car was
bought in Boston, and it had its share of stubborn fasteners, but I've had
everything apart since then, and it comes apart easily now.  A few things I
learned when working on cars in New England.....

Liquid Wrench does NOT equal WD-40.  WD40 and other spray lubricants don't
work like LW.  A friend swears by some stuff called "PB Blastr."  He's from
MA also, it seems good.  He knows the power of LW, and now is converted to
this PB stuff.  If I ever see it, I might get some.  Use LW *before* you
try to loosen anything.

HIT bolts with a hammer, a big one.  "Tapping" is not enough.  I remember
changing a pitman arm on a Chevy truck once with Rusty.  We were removing
the pitman arm, trying to....the arms are bolted on with three nuts on
tapered spindles, much like a tie rod end, but three.  We had the nuts off,
decent sized hammer, hitting it to no avail.  Rusty's father, Cam,(not
kidding) came over, watched us, laughed, said "don't hit it like a girl"
and whacked the thing.  Clunk, it fell on the floor.  Hit the bastards,
don't break stuff, but to me, "tapping" does not sound like enough.

Heat.  Not a cheesy propane bottle, but a torch - MAPP, acetylene, y'know,
a _torch_.  Get it HOT, then try.

For allen screws, clean the heads out (CV bolts, too) with compressed air/a
pick/whatever you can so the tool fits snugly in the head, goes a long way
to prevent stripping.  Phillips screws, too.  Dust cleaners from camera
stores work well for non-greasy dirt if you do not have a compressor, and
if you have an air tank used to fill tires at autocross events, buy an air
nozzle - it won't last long, but normally enough to clean out all 12 CV
bolts.  Never stripped a CV bolt, FWIW.  An air tank with a LOT of air in
it (IE, well past the recommended max) and an air impact wrench can be used
to get pesky strut nuts off.  It works.  If I did'nt have the ability to go
to a local tire store, I'd do it this way - rent the impact gun, go to a
good (high output, truckstops are good) compressor, FILL my airtank, go
home, remove nuts, normally have enough left over to put the nuts back on.
I think my tank is 15 gallon.  Bigger than some I've seen.  I think the
last time I did it I had 180psi in it.  Worked, the tank did not explode,
etc.

Let the LW soak.  I used to have a bigger problem when I did not let it
soak - now, I try to spray it well ahead of when I'll need it to work, and
it normally does.

Gotta go, hope this was of help!


Mannix


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