Another oil filter thread. Can't get the cover off

[BBS360]

I've been dousing the bolt/valve that holds the oil filter cover on with PB Blaster but it is solid as a rock.
Can't budge it by hand or with a cordless impact driver (120ft/lbs torque).

Looking at the diagrams I doubt that the PB Blaster is able to penetrate to the threads at all.
I am new to all this and have not disassembled an engine like it before. Is there a back-door through the engine that would allow me to get some PB Blaster on the threads?
Would it be advised to apply more than 120ft/lbs on the bolt?
Ideas?

 

[bcware]

The most effective techniques generally involve welding a bolt to the head of the stuck one.

Is the bolt stripped? If not I'd keep adding more torque. Maybe the cordless is not really putting out the full 120 ft/lbs; you never know!

There is no way to penetrate the threads that I know of.

 

[willem]

did you apply heat to the cover yet? that would be my next step, apart from more torque

 

[Lou Ranger]

I had a similar problem and once I was able to get a good grip on the bolt head (using special cam-equipped socket) I eventually got it off.
But not by using just the regular socket wrench. I had to put a 3' bar over the handle and really pull - I am sure WAY more than 120 lbs of torque.
Once loosened that first time, it works fine (had it off and on numerous times without any problem), so I don't think you need to worry about how much force it takes to break it loose.
Be careful when you put it back on though - oil filter cover is only supposed to be torqued 11 lbs.

 

[bcware]

The harmonic balancer on my car was supposed to have a little over 100 ft/lbs on it normally. I ended on using, I am not kidding, an 8-foot cheater bar to break it loose and it was still very difficult to break loose.

 

[angrybuddha]

Hiya,

haven't been stuck on a filter bolt before but been stuck with many a thread in my time! (Not that I'm really old or anything!)

One trick is to tighten it first and then loosen it although in this position it might not work best.

Impact/shock you have tried, sometimes in other situations I have resorted to hitting bolts with small hammers 300 times to shock it enough to loosen but you have to be careful not to damage the heads.

Heat is useful too but its the heating and cooling that helps to loosen the bond between the threads, as it you heat it it expands and this makes it tighter until it cools.
Heating the crank case around the bottom of the filter cover may help to expand the crankcase and thus make it easier to remove the bolt?

Have just looked up 120 lb ft and its only 162 Nm (I'm British so am forced to use metric) most good impact drivers are 450 Nm plus so perhaps a bigger driver or a long bar, a hammer and a friend?

If the head is not damaged I'd try a decent breaker bar and see how it feels, with experience you will get the feel for when to stop applying force.

Welding a bolt to the end is a good method because it heats the bolt up real hot, just make sure you let it cool first and weld it on dead straight axially.

And if all else fails, drill off the head and remove filter cover and then you'll be able to remove it in a number of ways.

Hope some of this helps

 

[iamunique127]

First, i'll state the most obvious, which you can probably disregard: the impact driver is in reverse isn't it?

OK, with that out of the way, maybe try running the engine to warm everything up. All the metal will expand. Heating the bolt itself will help by the heating and cooling as someone mentioned above but as also mentioned, you really want to expand the metal around the bolt. So running the engine til hot might be worth a try.

Good luck.

 

[BBS360]

Haha. No, the impact driver was not in reverse. It's just a cordless Hilti electric impact driver, though. Definitely not as strong as the compressed-air type that most automotive shops have.

In any case, it did eventually break loose. Cheater bar, rubber mallet, and patience.

I will be borrowing a propane torch to get the broken exhaust header studs out. That, the left hand drill bit from ebay, and an extraction kit, hopefully.

 

[angrybuddha]

Glad you got the filter off ok, but what did you use the rubber mallet for?

As to the left hand drill, I tried using one to loosen a snapped exhaust stud in a Suzuki Rf900 head, didnt do the trick, so I just drilled it out with regular drills of increasing size till it broken through the threads and then it wound out by hand. A heil coil insert and was all sorted.

Then i fixed 3 more of them on another suzuki I had, found it to be the best method for me, but getting the pilot hole in the centre of the bolt is the tricky bit!

 

[bcware]

I've never had any luck with bolt extractors on this engine; I just snap them over and over. I have always needed to drill the hardware out!