DanTheIROCMan

One of the water neck bolts broke off and remains inside the intake manifold. So I went out and got a 5/64 metal drill and drilled a hole through the middle then borrowed my friends EZ-Out kit. Well, the damn EZ-Out bit broke off in there trying to remove it. Luckily, I was able to remove the broken EZ-Out from there, so now I am stuck with a broken bolt and a hole in it.

So what are my options now besides buying a new lower intake manifold? Do I just need to try and drill out the remaining bolt material and then get a tap set to clean up the threads? Or what?? HELP!!!

Z28SORR

Continue to increase the drill size until you just contact the threads. In other words, get as much to the bolt out by drilling without damaging the threads. You can then "pick" out the remaning material with a small pick or other sharp pointy thing.
If you are unable to get the bolt out without damaging the threads you can install a Heli-coil to repare the hole.
Always use anti-seize compond when installing bolts in aluminum.

DanTheIROCMan

Thanks for the advice. I'll give it a shot. I didn't know that about the anti-seize. So, when is it appropriate to use thread locker and when is it appropriate to use anti-seize, considering they are quite the opposite??

aklim

Bring it to a machine shop if you are not confident. That or drill out the hole till you get a little past the threads and heli-core it.

IROC-T

Tread locker should only be used when something will be put under torque or subject to excessive vibration ( ie. cam gears ,flex plates ,pressure plates ,etc.) to keep then from loosening. Anti seize should only be used when you are useing two dissimilar metals (ie. Alum./iron ,stainless/alum. ,etc.),and when you are bolting through a water jacket use a thread SEALER of some type. Hope this helps.

aklim

Something else you can try is to heat the area up till it is hot and put a candle to it and allow the wax to soak into the threads. Then try the EZ Out again but gently this time.

TheGreatJ

I've seen this 3 times in the last year at work....all 3 times we've ended up snatching the intake off and sending it to a machine shop. They'll pull the bolt and repair the threads for less than $35 (for us anyway...it may be higher in your area or if the machinist doesn't like you.) It also provides a nice oppurtunity to port-match the intake to the heads.

IROC-T

If you have access to a welder ,another way to remove the bolt would be to weld a nut on it( place a nut over the bolt and weld it through the hole,plug weld.) and shoot alot of pennitrating oil on it to cool it down when it is cool it should turn out.

DanTheIROCMan

That welding on a nut is a damn good idea! To bad I already drilled most of the material out.

So now that I have most of the bolt material out, should I just go in there with a tap to force out the bolt material from the threads? I can't really get anything in there to "pick" the remaining material out. Also, it's very possible that I might have drilled some threads off from inside. Will the tap "cut" in new threads for me? Or do I need to dill out a bigger hole and put a heli-core in there?

aklim

How about a helicore?

IROC-T

You should be able to pick ( an Awl works well) at the top of the tread and pull enough of the tread up out of the groove so you can grab and pull the remainning thead out of the hole (confussssed ? ) with needle nose pliers. Try to make sure that the tap is following the old grooves and you will be OK, and as for the theads if you have not drilled TOO much of them out,there are some tread rebuild Epoxies out there that work well on aluminum,Prematex comes to mind there may be others and it's cheap.

DanTheIROCMan

I don't think there is anyway for me to distinguish where the bolt material ends and the aluminum starts. That bolt pretty much welded itself somehow to the aluminum. I broke 2 EZ-Outs trying to remove it and those EZ-Outs are freakin hard metal.

Also, I may not have drilled down directly in the center of the bolt originally so that through the whole thing off. I don't think a thread rebuild will work. I don't even know if a tap will work at this point because there are no visible threads. I think a helicore is probably my only option.

IROC-T

I never liked Heli coils they suck! If it's just the bolt for the water neck(?) drill it out and retap at the next size up,WHY can't you use bigger bolts?

DanTheIROCMan

Hey, that's an option. Because the bolt hole is already bigger in the water neck anyways so there's a little room to grow. Do taps work pretty good?

Botch

Tapping that will likely not work very good unless you get all of the old bolt out. Taps work good only if they have consistant contact, are perfectly square to the hole, and are cutting the same material all the way around. I have used a smaller diameter bolt to do this before and just tapped into the broken bolt. If you do go bigger you need to make sure you get the hole in the correct location. I would bolt your thermostat housing on and use the existing hole for a guide, drill and tap it for a helicoil, and helicoil it.