Heeeeeelp - Td5 Headbolt Broken - Need A Mobile Tig Welder

[Aukedrdw]

Guys I need someone's help BADLY.

Installing the head back into the Disco with all the new bits that I needed, I was 9/10th finished torqueing up the head ( did the 30 Nm, 65 Nm, 90 degrees, and was finishing the 180 degrees torque up) when - BAM - 2/3rds of one of the torque head bolt snapped off .......

Unfortunately, with MY luck, it wasn't one of the easy to get to FRONT bolts, no it had to be the B&%$#*D right at the back - nr11.

I have tried the following tools:

1) Chosel - No joy

2) Centre punch - No Joy

3) Air gun with smaller socket - SOME joy, the bolt moved 1/12th of a turn (anti-clockwise) and lost grip and stripped what was left of the structure on the head :(

4) Weld SOMETHING onto the head so that a socket / air gun can be put onto it - Now I have got a mig welder here (but no gas), but this tends to splutter & spark (even with the gas) and mates of mine in Europe used tig welders for these sofrts of jobs as they are much more precise, neat & tidy.

DOES ANYBODY HAVE A TIG WELDER & THE SKILL & THE TIME TO HELP ME OUT SOME EVENING THIS WEEK???? :confused:

I am in the Epping area of Sydney and trays of beer are on offer.......for my 'hero'

Auke

[Blknight.aus]

mate you might get some joy with a right angle drill and bur r then an easy out if no-one can help with the mig bit.

if theres anything left poking out of the head you can also use one of those spiral drive sockets if you can knock one on enough to get a grip.

[Aukedrdw]

Guys,

Here are some pictures of my predicament.....

5099

5100

5101

5102

5103

The problem, if I didn't explain this correctly above, is that I can't undo the bolt any more to put another one in. I need to do this, as it is not up to full torque yet....

Hope someone can give me some guidance & a helping tig ;)

Auke

[spudboy]

Have you got any bolt protruding at all?

Have you seen these sockets from Irwin:

http://www.irwin.com/irwin/consumer/jhtml/browse.jhtml?catId=IrwinCat100511

I got a set from Gasweld for $49 for the base set. There is another add on set for $45 to complete the set.

HTH
David

[spudboy]

OK - you quick posted in between me typing and pressing send.

Now I can see what you are trying to sort out.

The biggest "head" in the set I mentioned above has a diameter of 18.3mm. Is that enough to go around the base of the stud?

[Bigbjorn]

Can you get a hand held battery drill in there? If so, go to an engineering supplier and get a HSS twist drill with left hand helix of appropriate size. File or grind a flat spot on top of the bolt, centre punch liberally, and use the left hand helix drill bit in the battery drill in reverse. The thrust of the cutting action will mostly unwind the broken bolt out of the head.

[Aukedrdw]

Spudboy,

Thanks, the bolt extractor sounds really good, but will this handle the torque (estimated 250 Nm +)?

The head is down to about 10mm.

[spudboy]

Well it's the same design as a normal Sidchrome type socket, and you drive it with a 27mm socket over the top of the extractor (well, 27mm for the 19mm extractor, 25mm for the 16mm extractor etc.).

250nm is a lot though.

[Blknight.aus]

Have you got any bolt protruding at all?

Have you seen these sockets from Irwin:

http://www.irwin.com/irwin/consumer/jhtml/browse.jhtml?catId=IrwinCat100511

I got a set from Gasweld for $49 for the base set. There is another add on set for $45 to complete the set.

HTH
David

They are exactly the ones I was talking about, Go them first.

there is a shoulder on the bolt that you can CAREFULLY grind away to give it some fresh meat to bite into.

I'll be swinging past on saturday and will have a very slight amount of wiggle room in the schedule If you want me to have a look at it...

If you have no joy getting anyone else to voulenteer prior to thursday PM me and I'll throw my gasless Mig and air tools on board (Im assuming you have a decent air compressor)

Before you do ANY welding on it disconnect the battery, the alternator and the ECU.

[mcrover]

Drill out a 1/2" nut to fit snug over the left over head that is there and mig it to the top.

It should give enough purchase to get it un done.

You can just cover all the panels and the rest of the head with wet rags which will take care of the splatter.

To start with we dont know where you are as you dont have your location posted.

If you cant get gas then go get some gasless wire, small rolls are only about $20.

Failing that, just keep hammering smaller sockets onto it, not the best way to go but a bit of filing and a few sacraficial sockets normally does the trick.

[Slunnie]

Are you looking to continue doing up the bolt or replacing it? I'd assume the bolt is faulty and needs replacing.

I would also still MIG that rather than TIG because of the instant heat/weld that the MIG gives. The TIG is slower process even if it can be done at a cooler temperature, but you'll probably get a lot of heat sinking into the alloy head which may cause additional problems. For the spatter, just cover everything up.

[Aukedrdw]

Dave,

Any time you can give me will be brilliant!

Is it worth me trying the IRWIN bolt extractor in the mean time, or this is one of those acquired skills.....?

Auke

[lokka]

Yep id go the weld a big nut on trick with plenty of heat with a mig gassless will do tho id say you will get a stronger weld with gas and a good 200amps worth of weld you should only need 1 good hot spot and it will have enough strength and to stop the spatter use the mig inside a tube and wear a glove to cover the end were you put the gun down inside the tube this will stop spatter going every were ...

With the mig and the nut just sit it over the top of what ya have put the tube over the bolt head stick in the nozel cover with gloved hand and pull the trigger for a few secs to get a nice hot spot and you will get it this way :D:D:D:D:D:D

[zwitter]

Hi
If you mean Epping in Sydney then I am reasonably close and have a TIG

BUT
I would agree with Lokka. Get a big nut that sits down over whats left and fill the top with weld. This is probab;ly better done with a mig than a tig. Or even a stick. Could also use a piece of flat bar or square bar, anything you can get a grip on.

A few problems could be the very high carbon content of the bolt an the annealing of the top of the bolt and shaft.

Other option is the die grinder and burr and shape the top to take a socket or cut a slot

Good luck.

PM me if you really get stuck but would be friday night or weekend before I could visit.


james

[Blknight.aus]

Dave,

Any time you can give me will be brilliant!

Is it worth me trying the IRWIN bolt extractor in the mean time, or this is one of those acquired skills.....?

Auke

Buy the set (and me some too ;) ) and gently have a go Dont damage the shoulder doing it As I'll be using that as part of the weld base...

In the mean time you need to do some prep work as my time will be very limited and I will be needing to move like greek lightning.

1st grab a metal can and cut a hole in it a little bigger than the bolts shoulder trim and beat it into shape and slide it over the bolt.

then get a fire blanket (or an old wool blanket) and cut a small hole in it that will allow access to the bolt but cover the rest of the engine and bay.

All the prep work for welding needs to be done too.

you will also need a nut that is a tap on fit over whats left of the head and has a hex that is smaller than the shoulder of the bolt. If that means drilling out a smaller bolt so be it.

Ive got a couple of butchers tricks I will try before I pull out the welder but Im guessing its going to come to that so the more prepwork youve gotten acomplished the more time Ive got to be nasty to it.

[DRanged]

Hey Auke

Justin here.

Mate one thing you can try is to grind off the rest of the damaged hex and then gently grind a small channel across the bolt say 10mm wide and a couple of mm deep. Then you can weld on a piece of 10mm wide flat bar by 30 - 40mm high. This will give you a chance to get a 15 or 18" shifter on it. Dont forget that a good arc or stick welder is just as good or better ( in the right hands ).

Just a thought mate.

See you over xmas.

Justin

[rovercare]

Get a half inch drive 8mmish hex drive and mig it on, gives you the drive for a breaker bar

Or even a nut as others suggets, a reasonable mig weld will hold it on easily, tig will be a pain

[DEFENDERZOOK]

whats wrong with using a decent set of vice grips on it.......?




blknight.......how long you gonna be in sydney for.....?

[Blknight.aus]

too bloody long.....

I'll be whistle stopping through on saturday on my way to canberra I'll be coming from dobbos so I have maybe 4 hours up my sleeve to do a consignment drop, attack this head and get moving.

I Might be stopping off on the way back up tho.

[DEFENDERZOOK]

when will that be....?
what day......weekend or during the week....?

[awabbit6]

whats wrong with using a decent set of vice grips on it.......?



I was going to suggest that too. Would have to be a very good pair done up real tight. It's the sort of job you'd only get one good go at.

[Blknight.aus]

I' should be in place to attack that bolt by 0830 if all goes in accordance to the plan....

to prevent thread hijacks Multiple Pms have been sent.

[EchiDna]

had a bolt snap the head clean off in a block once... had about 15mm of threaded section stickin out (aloominuuum block)

took three days of penetrine, repeated heating the bolt with a paint stripper while keeping the block cold (ice packs), alternated with heating the block and cooling the bolt quickly with ice. I filed a pair of flats on the opposite sides of the remnants and gave it all a final heat and cool the bolt only then stuck a good quality, tightly fitting frozen 18 inch shifter on it and I swear I could have turned it out by hand... big relief all round and a beer or two for my mate the metalurgist for his suggestions :)

[Aukes_Smartermate_lol]

Dude!

(see I even registered on here to show my love, lol :p )

We called you bush mechanic in NL in jest. Don't blemish the good name of it at home in Oz by buggering around please! :D


Couple of thoughts-

are you SURE it is not already up to or past the required torque setting? That way you could leave it for another day at least. It appears practically in as far as needed.



Otherwise means that either you were using crap tool (not typical of you), were gungho to point of silliness (not typical of you - well almost:D ), or the bolt head was defective. Would be good to be sure and share that knowlegde with the forum.

Bolt welding seems to be the best solution. I'd be inclined to remove as much as possible out of the head - rockers etc in view of your current luck.

I'd have given 50c to have seen and heard you as this happened - stop being shy and stick the skype web cam up in the garage please!

Progress report eagerly awaited. Good to see the Landycrew are as friendly as teamclog ;)

[Aukes_Smartermate_lol]

And have you bought the IRWIN and tried this yet?

It looks the business and I'd imagine it's designed to take loads like this.

[stevo]

by the looks of what is left do not think there is enough left of the head for an irwin to get a grip plus they are for normal bolt heads, if it near the factory torque setting even using an easy out is risky untill you remove the shoulder off the bolt head which would remove the clamping force and make removing the bolt easier.

This is how I would do it if I had no access to a welder, first grind the head flat, then carefully drill a small centre hole go up a couple of drill sizes to suit an easy out drill this hole below the shoulder of the bolt,next drill a hole that is bigger than the bolt shank by a couple of mm and drill carefully till the bolt head comes off.

This should now make it easy to remove the bolt make sure you have a new bolt to go straight in,ths bolt is a pain to get to you may have to undo the rear gear box mounts and jack up the trans to allow you to drill the holes with a normal drill

[JohnE]

this is turning into a good story
don;t forget to take photos of daves work at each stage,
has the makings of a good how too!!!!!

Dave does this go towards a credit in one of the competency areas.?




john

[BMac]

Can you replace one head bolt if the rest are already torqued up? How important is the sequence and stages with these heads?

Bruce.

[Aukedrdw]

Guys Thanks for your hints & tips.

I will be taking pictures of all of the gory details for you to lust over!

I hope that no one else has to experience these joy's any time soon!!!

Dave the generous soul, is coming to help me (well actually I think I will be helping him;) ) Saturday morning - early.

He has given me some homework to finish beforehand though, so I'd better get cracking!

Will keep you a brest of the 'progress'.

[Blknight.aus]

Can you replace one head bolt if the rest are already torqued up? How important is the sequence and stages with these heads?

Bruce.

You can But I wouldnt risk it IF theres been coolant or otherfluid let into the system...

As its an alloy head on a turbo diesel Everythings got to be A1 or your in for trouble at some point.

It would be helpfull if the bonnet was off as well.

AS one final thing about an hour before Im due to get there get your wifes hair drier or a hot air gun and aim it at the bolt and let it sit that way for about 1 hr so everythings nice and toasty (but not red hot) for when I get there. IF you dont have that a 500w halogen lamp aimed into the area at a short distance will do the same trick overnight.

[roversmith]

Beg borrow or steal a dremel grinder, grind a hexagonal shape on the shoulder of the bolt, use a single hex socket, if you are religious pray a lot. TD5 head studs are single use only.

Greg

[Aukedrdw]

Gents,

THANKS to all of you for your thoughts & tips!

SPECIAL thanks to our BLKNIGHT.AUS in Shining armour who rode into our street in a rather nice Deep red Defender, towing a masive trailer full of tinker goodies like a compressor, spare wheels, solar panel, etc.

I was asked to have everything ready for an 08:00 AM start and after having scavanged my wife's 2 hair dryers whilst she was still sleeping :p, I set these up to heat up the area of interest and covered it all with a fibreglass insulating mat to stop the heat from ecaping.

5159

Upon Dave's arrival, we firstly tried to use the IRWIN bolt extractor on the bolt on its own, but it was soon apparent that this would not work on the account of a lack of body for the IRWIN to grip onto. See pictures earlier in this thread for the state of the bolt that we had to work with.

DAVE next set about welding the nut I had prepared (earlier ;) for him) to the head of the bolt. I have to admit, I was a little retisent about this part of the operation, especially with Dave continuously muttering that there were no garauntees.......

5160

The welding looked to have gone OK, but when the IRWIN was coupled to the end of the airgun, the result was not all that rosey:

5161

Out came the dye grinder - for those of you who don''t know what this is, it is a pneumatic drill that looks and sounds like the one your dentist uses, except that this one had been on steroids whilst in the womb and makes mince of steel & aluminium, with the according mess!

On with the IRWIN on the end of the airgun again and ....... OOPS..... all the welds broke from the impacts of the airgun.

Looking at each other, we both knew that our chances for welding again were all but....ONE....

So, out came the welder again, a (lot) more agression from our side and a new (ex Ford wheel nut) was welded onto the headbolt like it had to survive the next Hiroshima attack....

5162

(Oh and YES, it IS a Disco..... :cool:)

I think the threat of further butchery subdued the bolt into submission.

Tomorrow all will be revealed whether the actions were worth doing.

If all else fails, a little birdy told me that an Isuzu 3.9 engine would bolt straight in without ANY modifications..... She HAS been warned (the car that is).

Thanks again to all of you for your support and hope to see you on a trail some time soon.

Auke

[rangieman]

Great to hear good luck

Gotta love the PPE , shorts and thongs while welding:eek:

[dobbo]

Great to hear good luck

Gotta love the PPE , shorts and thongs while welding:eek:


It's Ok he had his Nutrigrain and a few cups of coffee before he left here (he was invinsible).

:D:D

Look at him in action, he just knows he's good.

:D:D

[100I]

It's Ok he had his Nutrigrain and a few cups of coffee before he left here (he was invinsible).

:D:D

Look at him in action, he just knows he's good.

:D:D

FIGJAM

[JohnE]

Nothing like photos of a man on a mission, I like the casual look.

and success at the end,



john

[edddo]

and the outcome is........?:)

[Blknight.aus]

Great to hear good luck

Gotta love the PPE , shorts and thongs while welding:eek:

hey the hips legs and feet are all adequately protected by the workshirt thats untucked hanging down in front of them...



FIGJAM

No need for that mate, Dobbos got my back,



:D:D

Look at him in action, he just knows he's good.

:D:D

See why blow my trumpet when other people are perfectly willing to. :twisted:


and the outcome is........?:)

Apparently as of about 1700 yesterday, its going. I called to double check that Id warned him about a post fuel system bleed/prestart check and got told that I had impeccable timing as it had been started only5 seconds prior to my call....


From my side of things I went with 5 stages of butchery available to me and wound up getting to stage 3/5 to get it out.

The stages were

1. irwin (bit of a dream I know but worth trying to start with)

2. internal weld the nut onto the head, Id hoped this would work as it minimises risk of heat shock to the top of the head. It didnt. As I had sort of expected after the irwin fetta cheesed the remnents of the bolt I had a good indication that there were multiple stress fractures inwhat was left of the metal. Application of bulk torque to the nut simple sheared more bolt head metal out.

3. Fillet welding a chamfered nut (wheel nuts are ideal for this on these kinds of bolts) onto the shoulder of the bolt after carefull centering.

4. Die grinding the bolt flatish and then using a drill in extractor (which so far IME if it wont work simply stalls or spins inthe hole it drills but Ive never broken one in place yet)

5.after the pilot had been setup by the drill in extractor deepening the hole with a left twist drill and then using a normal extractor AFTER carfully diegrinding the guts out of the head to allow the shoulder to be snapped off.


So It came out where I was expecting it would and fortunately not where I had feared it would resist to but annoyingly not where I would have liked it to.

I did consider multi and vice grips but getting them on would have left me no room to turn them.


Hopefully hes now got the injector seals sorted and its all good.

[RonMcGr]

hey the hips legs and feet are all adequately protected by the workshirt thats untucked hanging down in front of them...




No need for that mate, Dobbos got my back,



See why blow my trumpet when other people are perfectly willing to. :twisted:



Apparently as of about 1700 yesterday, its going. I called to double check that Id warned him about a post fuel system bleed/prestart check and got told that I had impeccable timing as it had been started only5 seconds prior to my call....


From my side of things I went with 5 stages of butchery available to me and wound up getting to stage 3/5 to get it out.

The stages were

1. irwin (bit of a dream I know but worth trying to start with)

2. internal weld the nut onto the head, Id hoped this would work as it minimises risk of heat shock to the top of the head. It didnt. As I had sort of expected after the irwin fetta cheesed the remnents of the bolt I had a good indication that there were multiple stress fractures inwhat was left of the metal. Application of bulk torque to the nut simple sheared more bolt head metal out.

3. Fillet welding a chamfered nut (wheel nuts are ideal for this on these kinds of bolts) onto the shoulder of the bolt after carefull centering.

4. Die grinding the bolt flatish and then using a drill in extractor (which so far IME if it wont work simply stalls or spins inthe hole it drills but Ive never broken one in place yet)

5.after the pilot had been setup by the drill in extractor deepening the hole with a left twist drill and then using a normal extractor AFTER carfully diegrinding the guts out of the head to allow the shoulder to be snapped off.


So It came out where I was expecting it would and fortunately not where I had feared it would resist to but annoyingly not where I would have liked it to.

I did consider multi and vice grips but getting them on would have left me no room to turn them.


Hopefully hes now got the injector seals sorted and its all good.

Well done, Dave.

You go down in history as the "Super Land Rover mechanic" who does not give up :D

You are truly a dedicated man :)

[DEFENDERZOOK]

not only that....he drove down all the way from queensland......just to remove a headbolt.......