Will this welder work for now

It sounds like by brazing you are telling me to do what I'm talking about doing. Jam a allen key socket on there weld it to the bolt. let it cool off, stick a breaker bar on it and pull it loose.

Brazing will work but may be hard to keep it away from the sides. Are both steel, if the outside is aluminum, then brazing/welding won stick (will make a mess of it.)

Cobalt bits are designed for hard steel. They are brittle though so you need to be careful (I use the clutch on my drill.)

I have taken a grinding wheel and cut a slot so I can use a big screwdriver. Have even ground the whole area out with a die grinder (a dremel will do in a pinch.) Not aproblem if the part can be replaced or welded then redrilled (or left with the area ground out you don't care about looks.)

Am I correct in my assumption that the bolt in question is on a manifold?
If not is it a stainless bolt? Dont be hard on us welding forums......you are asking us for advice and we are trying to help. Yes you are clearly out of pocket and frustrated, but before you jump in with buying loads of unnecessary tools take a step back and think it through.
I have been here myself so speak from experience.
Step 1 to us helping......give us a photograph.
Step2 Sit back and enjoy the help.

Buying a welder may not be the answer to this, but equally it might be!

It sounds to me also that you want to buy a welder and see this problem as a way of justifying the purchase........no offence meant.

If you are welding something to the recess in the torx it's easier to put an ordinary bolt in there then use a socket on the bolt head. I do it with my mig and as above it's the heat that usually helps as much as the extra grip. Last thing I did it on was an Allen head calliper bolt which I knocked M10 bolt into and welded then used a 17mm socket to release it. You might get enough control if you shorten a rod but it will be hard work with an arc welder, a few good tacks around it should do the job though. Here's one out of the scrap.

I would'nt weld an allen key in either, it might break near the weld or just twist as pressure is applied because the temper will be distorted. I would'nt consider buying an arc welding set that is below 150amp. You may have to spend over your budget here but below 150 amp is a waste of money. (no offence ment to people who already have small welders). I would weld a thick washer onto the top of the bolt first, then a hex nut or bolt onto that, leave it to cool before applying pressure as the heat from the welding will have expanded it making it take even a stronger grip. The edge of an allen bolt will be thinish so tacks or stop start welding it to the washer might be the way.

Can I ask how you were drilling a lot of people make the mistake of drilling too fast or not enough pressure, not trying to be patronising but if you drill slowly using firm pressure and plenty of lube you should be able to either drill the head of the fastener off if the thing thats fastened down is removable then extract the remaining stud, or drill and use an easy out which is reverse threaded.

as I said not trying to be patronising if you already knew this but a lot of people make that mistake and blunt and snap drill bits trying to remove bolts I know I used to untill some one showed me where I was going wrong

Hi Comrade,

(My god, Never thought I'd say that) I used to work on some machinery that would develop this problem, I know where you are coming from. Similar situation with a recessed allen caphead bolt.

First off, Allen & Torx bolts are usually made of 10.8 (or harder) steel therefore cannot be drilled with standard HSS bits, Cobalt will work with care but when you have drilled it, Easy-Out's won't work as they are softer than the bolt, and just get chewed up or snap.

I found that this technique would (nearly) always work. get a short piece of 20mmx6mm (3/4x1/4) flat bar, drill a hole in it slightly smaller than the outside diameter of the bolt head. Clamp it securely over the damaged bolt head, then working through the hole, fill the bolt head with weld and subsequently weld to the flat bar. Whilst taking care due to the heat, turn the flat bar and bolt using a large shifter (adjustable spanner). I think MIG welding would work best, never tried it with a stick welder.

I'm pretty certain that as stated earlier, it is the heat that does the job.

This method only failed me once, then had to resort to the air chisel and gas axe.

The bolt in question was a high tensile M10 caphead, recessed hole in a cast iron bed plate into a blind threaded hole in an aluminium casting. The whole assembly lived in refrigerated room. A disaster waiting to happen!!

forgive this being hard to read, I'm trying to give as much info as I can so it is really wordy.

So where to begin? The story is: I have to remove the front timing cover to get to the variable valve timing mechanism, so I can mark and adjust its position before pulling the head. So I have to take the fan and the belt off. The belt was easy, the bearing(sp?) for the fan is mounted on the front timing cover with the bolts blocked by the pulley.

After spending 70 bucks on the flat wrench to do this, the bolt that holds the pulley on, that no less than 3 "certified" Mercedes mechanics told me was allen strips out cause its TORX. Insult to injury, along with the allen SOCKET set I used, I HAVE TORX sockets. Thats bolt one. WAY WAY WAY recessed.

SO I pull the radiator and condenser. Buy a drill to replace my stolen one, and 90 degree kit, and I still only have room for this tiny bit because mercedes routes the power steering lines in front of the condenser in a way that takes all the space, to cool the fluid. This can't be removed without pulling the fender. The bit is snapping.

Next I figured that if pulled ALL the other brackets at the same time it would make just enough space to back the bolts out a little bit at a time. This goes well and I get all the bolts out but one TORX bolt which I thought would be allen (entirely my own fault) and it stripped too. Its on the front of the engine and I have the same amount of room to drill, and it IS recessed but I have a little room to get to the face. I think I could mig this if I had one.

At this point I decided to call the race "team" and call in all my favors to get the mig welder we were going to use, early. I got about 500 to drop on this thing. So I am looking at a hobart 140 for $470 which is under the 150 amp recommendation, but is the highest power 120volt I can get easily. Or a hobart 187 for 450, but the only 220 I have in the garage where the car is (temp) right now is the drier plug in the garage with a twist lock. My actual shop if the landlord will quit screwing me and either get his stuff out or give me my deposit back, has 220, so thats not a problem except it doesn't really help me RIGHT NOW!

Originally Posted by comrade904 At this point I decided to call the race "team" and call in all my favors to get the mig welder we were going to use, early. I got about 500 to drop on this thing. So I am looking at a hobart 140 for $470 which is under the 150 amp recommendation, but is the highest power 120volt I can get easily. Or a hobart 187 for 450, but the only 220 I have in the garage where the car is (temp) right now is the drier plug in the garage with a twist lock. My actual shop if the landlord will quit screwing me and either get his stuff out or give me my deposit back, has 220, so thats not a problem except it doesn't really help me RIGHT NOW!

Could it make more sense to call in a mobile welder who already has all the gear and, moreover, the skill to weld some metal to your recessed bolt? I supported your initial idea of using a cheap arc welder because I'm confident I could use such an approach to do a rough weld in that type of situation. The arc rod is a fine point and quite easy to position.

How big is the key for the bolt head?
go next size up and carefully grind the thing to a shallow taper that is just over size to fit in the damaged bolt ,
Get a steel bar the size of the bolt head and grind the tip to make a nipple that will allow you to locate the bar in the bolt .

Heat the bar to bright read and hold it square into the bolt head for a mimute , re heat and do it again to expand the bolt and hopefully break any adhesion that may exist, now knock the ground down tool into the head and carefully using continious gentle pressure try to undo it, keeping the tool on the correct axis , none of this trying to wind it around in three inch circles stuff. Dont try to jerk the undoing for as you say the hole in the head is damaged ,all you will do is make it worse with a jerking motion.
If it is stuck slip an extension and T bar on addd a little bit of pressure then tap the T bar whilst under pressure and it being on the correct alignment ..... this often allows removal of such wrecked bolts /screws.


Rigid make a set of screw extractors ( fairly expensive ) that have fluted rods and special nuts that fit over the fluted rods undo as stated above , under slight tension and a tap with an 8 ounce hammer , after drilling it out and giving the bolt a bit of the heat treatment ........ Oh if you get Rigid screw extractors RTFM .....it helps no end .

They are easily available in the USA , ( knighton-tools.co.uk sell them they cost about £120 per set but ) well worth the dosh if you are a serious engineer ..have used them for over 45 years and only had one of the 4 mm ones break ( it was already compromised by some knuckle dragger with a big hammer and little brain)

Failing all above there are some weld techniques where by you sleeve up an " R "steel bar that fits down the hole with an unsulator to stop arcing out on the hole side wall. ..make it as long as is easily accesible , borrow /hire a 200 plus amp welder, wind it to full and carefully and squarely insert the insulated rod down the hole , then shove the live rod down onto the bolt head so as to 2 stud weld it . The trick on this is to get the current off asa soon a possible ..a stud welder does it automatically but some one standing by the plug 7 socket can switch it off .(often results in a blown fuse ) .

Seeing you need a right angle in a closed space can you bend the bar to suit and then stud weld it ???

I have managed to stud weld like this using hose pipe as the sleeve over four feet down into an axle tube to remove broken bolts on a failed pinion gear to allow the fitting of new ones just so we could remove & replace the whole pinion . I used Stilsons ( monkey wrench) & a 1 lb hammer on the bar after supporting the free end to stop wavering.
All you would need in your case is a bit of tube in the bar to increase the leverage and a small hammer so that once you get the gentle pressure on the bar you can tap the bar ( initally not the tube ) a couple of times whilst slightly increasing the pressure ( keep the alighment though if posible ).
If it loosens cut the right angle off and used gorilla type grips to remove the remaining straight bar bit & bolt.

There is also the option of finding someone who does spark errosion work to errode the bolt head but it could be very very expensive ( a couple of hundred £ here in the UK ) and you would normally have get the vehicle to them and then still have to remove the bolt at the end of the day .