EZ out broke, now what?

[bfried]

hey guys, kinda new to the forum but have had the 400 for a while. the problem: skid plate bolts snapped flush with swingarm. ez out bits snapped flush with swingarm. whats the next step to try and get the broken bolts and bits out? thank you for the help guys-Brian

[moddedblaster20]

id try left handed cobalt drill bits first

[bfried]

thanks for the advice, ill try them tomorrow. if they dont work my next step is heating the bolts?

[CJM]

Left hand drill bit would be best.

If the EZ out snapped its gonna be a bear to drill out tho. If I were you it might be prudent to weld a bolt or nut to it and try and remove it that way. Make sure if you do do that, to heat the crap out of the thing once welded with an oxy/acetylene torch. Heat works very well for removing stuff like this.

All else fails weld that flush or leave it be, find another spot on your swinger and drill and tap a new hole and drill a hole in the skid.

FYI: When putting all the bolts back on use anti-seize so they never seize again. Also dont use EZ outs, they snap. Drill thru the bolt and helicoil it.

[MidnightBlade]

from what i understand all of the bolts snapped offso the skid plate should fall right? pretty sure the skid plate is off not sure if understand correctly or not but almost positive it is

[slightlybent47]

I would make sure that putting that much heat on it doesn’t make the steel weak.

Just leave the skids off.

[CJM]

Oh didnt see that, all of them snapped..thats not good.

See if you can smash the EZ out with a cold chisel then, that may work since they are brittle.

Good way to make them really brittle is to take some canned CO2 and turn it upside down and spray the crap out of it-it is very cold and will make the EZ out metal brittle

[MidnightBlade]

Originally posted by slightlybent47
I would make sure that putting that much heat on it doesn’t make the steel weak.

Just leave the skids off.
no offense but not everyone races. skids save lots of money trail riding do id atleast let the stock skid on or upgrade to an aluminum one

[bfried]

thanks for the quick responses guys lots of help here. im trying the drill bits tomorrow, and i plan on using lots of oil when trying to drill them out. i heard you cant drill through ez outs, any truth to that? if all else fails im going to tap new threads a few millimeters over from the old threads and hope i dont catch the carrier. will keep posted tomorrow.

[CJM]

Sorry to contradict my earlier post, I forget sometimes EZ outs are not easy to drill at all. You can try but smashing them out with a nice punch works better. Also some small picks will dig the stuff out. Making the things cold too will make them more brittle-like I said canned CO2 and SMASH!

A nice punch and a 3-4lb hand sledge does the job.

An EZ out is made of cobalt and its brittle-thats why they break.

You can also drill around it with a smaller bit, but this means your new hole your gonna taps gonna be huge unless you fill it with a weld and start over with a totally smooth surface.

Also if you can find a good welder they can burn it out too. But that might compromise the swinger a bit.

Also could do electrical spark discharge, but good luck finding someone who does it and it aint cheap. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Electrical_discharge_machining

Now, depending on how much is in there this might be fun.

Once you get it all out you got 3 choices:
1. Helicoil which is nothing more than a slightly larger tap and replace the threads with a little insert. Works pretty good but swinger takes alot of abuse.

2. Timesert. Kinda like a helicoil but you drill thru and this thing taps right into the hole and creates a threaded hole for ya. They use them alot when people strip out sparkplugs.

3. Drill it out nicely and tape it for another size. Afterall you can drill the skid, its only aluminum so drill and tap to a larger size works.



Out of all 3, #3 is the cheapest, easiest and strongest. Make sure to use grade 8 metric bolts as they are stronger, tap might be harder to find but its worth it.

Like I said, use anti-seize when you put the new ones in and they wont ever seize again.

[bfried]

when and if i get them out im probably going to tap them out bigger, i feel it is the easiest way, but of course we know nothing goes as planned. thank a lot for the help guys going to be tackling this tomorrow!

[CJM]

Good luck with it, try the smash method first if you can as drilling will be near impossible.

[bfried]

got the 2 bolts on top free, the ones on the carrier are not budging for anything, no methods have worked. and i managed to destroy the mounting tabs on the swing arm. its not going well and running out of options!

[IcutMetl]

EZ Outs are brittle, but don't shatter as easily as taps, end mills, etc- they still have to resist some torsion when someone goes to back out a stuck bolt. Drilling them with a standard drill bit...you'll have a hard go at that one. EZ Outs are a pain to use...and use right...and I've also broke plenty of them. Easiest way I've found is to mount them on a mill, center over the hole, and plunge a carbide end mill thru it, and then do the same off center in either direction- at some point you'll be able to collapse it and save the original tapped hole. Of course, not everyone has that capability.

[CJM]

Originally posted by bfried
got the 2 bolts on top free, the ones on the carrier are not budging for anything, no methods have worked. and i managed to destroy the mounting tabs on the swing arm. its not going well and running out of options!

Weld the holes up and drill/tap new holes about a inch further from the old ones and drill new holes in the skid if all else fails.