[urq] Frozen Sub Frame Bolts - Help

[Andrew Finney]

Many thanks to everyone, especially Richard. I drilled
holes through each bushing rubber and the subframe
fell off. I then soaked then overnight with oil and
then rapped each bolt a few times in each direction to
loosen the conical section of the internal bushing
steel part from the car body. Two unscrewed easily.
The 3rd required more "tapping" and a grinder to
remove half of the conical section. It too then came
off easily.

Reassembly was a piece of cake with new bolts.

Andrew Finney
1983 ad 1984 UrQs.


--- Louis-Alain Richard <laraa at sympatico.ca> wrote:

> Hi Andrew,
> 
> You have a "nice" problem there...
> 
> Don't worry about the remaining stud: if you do get
> the subframe out, you
> will unwind the remaining with your fingers. On my
> car, the rust-protectant
> (wax based) in the chassis channels was covering the
> end of the bolts so
> they were still in good shape and not frozen. But
> like in your car, one of
> the bolts was frozen into a steel sleeve and very
> hard to unwind. But I
> manage to remove it by careful work of the bolt;
> unwind, wind, unwind...
> But that's not what you want to hear, right? :-)
> 
> The only solution I see is this one: (I have my old
> bushings here, as I type
> this reply...)
> 1- Cut (horizontally) the bottom part of the
> bushings. One easy way to do it
> is an angle grinder with a coarse grit. That way
> you'll see where to drill
> in point 2.
> 2- Drill as many holes as you can do into the rubber
> between the 2 steel
> sleeves (thick central one, thin outer one). You
> want to destroy the rubber
> part of the bushing without destroying the subframe
> itself. Be careful.
> 3- Try to lever the subframe from the chassis,
> leaving there the bolt and
> its "shroud" (the inner sleeve). 
> 4- Unwind the remnants (hopefully).
> 
> From my experience with such a "frozen" bolt, you
> can't force it out of the
> sleeve, nor spin it, the friction is just too high.
> 
> So before doing anything that will leave a (too
> short) broken bolt in the
> captive nut, and considering a subframe is easy to
> find, you want to do all
> you can to unwind the bolt and its "rust shroud".
> 
> Hope this helps,
> 
> Louis-Alain
> 83 Quattro, 
> with only 1 (out of 8) stuck bushing bolt.
> Surprising for a Canadian car...
> 
> 
> 
> 
> -----Message d'origine-----
> Andrew Finney
> 
> 
> OK, bad news first. 3 of my 4 rear subframe bolts
> sheared off when I tried to remove them. Good news
> is
> they sheared off at the bolt heads. Bad news is they
> are frozen into the steel sleeve of the bushing and
> I
> can't pry the subrame off the car. Any suggestions
> or
> help with this? How can I get the subframe off!!!
> 
> When, and if, I finally get the subframe off, other
> than prodigious heat application, is there a stud
> removal tool/proceedure that I should use.
> 
> Thanks in advance.
> 
> Andrew Finney
> 1983 and 1984 UrQs.
> 
> 
> 



		
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