Black Bug
Well-Known Forum User
Inspired by Wyn's ability to stuff a completely new engine in to his car in about 3 seconds I thought I'd better do something and sort out my battery retainer thing. It would appear that some evil previous owner had managed to shear off the bolt that holds the square retainer to the firewall, and rather than do the decent thing and sort it out they got a smaller battery and mounted the retainer lower on the firewall with a self-tapper. May they burn in hell.
So off I go to get the bolt out with my newly aquired extractors. Manage to drill a vaguely centred hole (bit of an awkward location!) Start with the smallest extractor. Does nothing. Try the next size up, also does nothing apart from making the hole bigger. So try the next size up which does a damn good job of digging in but still totally fails to budge the bolt.
Arse I thought, might as well tap what's there to accept a M6 bolt and be done. So I drill out to 5mm, easy. Bung the tap in and start it off, no probs, when all of a sudden, snap. Fan-frikkin-tastic. One tap nicely snapped off flush with the fire wall. Only by great force of will did I manage not to tell the world exactly what I thought of it at that stage. I then thought, "hows about taking the wiper cowling off so you can get at the tap from the otherside?!" No probs, I've had that off a couple of times already, so within mere minutes it's off and I'm looking at a completely inaccessible area exactly where I want to get too. Typically on the opposite of the car is totally open and getting in there would be a doddle. I despair.
So now I'm left with a piece of nicely hardened steel embedded in a nicely sieze bolt, leaving me with very little option but to bodge the bloody battery retainer to fit the correct size battery. Somehow staying in bed this morning would probably have been the right option
Thanks for reading, you've been a great audience!
Cheers,
Rob
So off I go to get the bolt out with my newly aquired extractors. Manage to drill a vaguely centred hole (bit of an awkward location!) Start with the smallest extractor. Does nothing. Try the next size up, also does nothing apart from making the hole bigger. So try the next size up which does a damn good job of digging in but still totally fails to budge the bolt.
Arse I thought, might as well tap what's there to accept a M6 bolt and be done. So I drill out to 5mm, easy. Bung the tap in and start it off, no probs, when all of a sudden, snap. Fan-frikkin-tastic. One tap nicely snapped off flush with the fire wall. Only by great force of will did I manage not to tell the world exactly what I thought of it at that stage. I then thought, "hows about taking the wiper cowling off so you can get at the tap from the otherside?!" No probs, I've had that off a couple of times already, so within mere minutes it's off and I'm looking at a completely inaccessible area exactly where I want to get too. Typically on the opposite of the car is totally open and getting in there would be a doddle. I despair.
So now I'm left with a piece of nicely hardened steel embedded in a nicely sieze bolt, leaving me with very little option but to bodge the bloody battery retainer to fit the correct size battery. Somehow staying in bed this morning would probably have been the right option
Thanks for reading, you've been a great audience!
Cheers,
Rob
