Front drive shaft removal help

[Coastie]

Hey guys,

I was attempting to replace the universal joint in my front drive shaft and ran into an issue when I got up to the 4 bolts that hold the retaining straps onto the front diff / companion joint. (This area Broken Front Driveshaft) The first 8mm bolt holding the retaining strap came out no problem but the other 3 are stripped. If I cut them off they are going to be stubs stuck in the yoke coming out of the front diff. I tried vice grips, heat, a good soaking of PB blaster.

I was thinking of possibly cutting the straps in the middle just the get the shaft out and have some more room to clamp on the bolt heads with vice grips. If I can get that far I want to put it on my buddy's lift and hit it with oxy-acetylene because my canned gas isn't hot enough quick enough.


Any ideas other than what I'm thinking? Any reason not to go forward with what I was wanting to do? Right now because the u-joint is still in there you just can't get a good hold of the screw head, the join't blocks the head of the vise grips.

Thanks.

[Beast Of Burden]

I ran into the same problem when I pulled my trans. I went to NAPA and bought an extractor set. They look like sockets but the have for lack of a better description, a swirl shape inside so when you try to loosen the bolt it cuts into the stripped bolt head and it came right out. I would still highly recomend using an oxy-acetylene torch too, they work well but you only get one maybe two trys before the bolt is too messed up to work. If you cant find what im talking about let me know ill take a pic of the extractor set tomorrow

[Coastie]

Thanks for the tip. I saw those at Harbor Freight the other day but I'm not sure they will get the job done. These bolts might be beyond repair but I'll pick up a set anyways to try out.

My buddy suggested that if I do whiz off the clamps to file two side of the bolt head flatter before I hit them with heat and the vise grips. Anyone do this before?

[forddieseldoctor]

The twist socket extractors will take them out if you get the good ones. I know that the Snap-on ones will do it for a fact. Use a 5/16 6 point socket to install the new bolts so that you don't round them off. They are actually a 5/16 and not an 8mm. If my memory serves me correctly they are american thread also not metric.

[Coastie]

I will try and get my hand on a quality extractor set as you mentioned. About the 5/16, I thought that was it but there was play, the 8mm 6point Blue-Point (poor man's Snap-On but I like em) fit it real snug. Like I said, the first one came out easy and the second was it was too late, When I realized it was slipping the damage was done. I'll try and find a set as you all suggested.

Thanks again!

[forddieseldoctor]

5/16 is 7.9 mm aka slightly smaller.

[Coastie]

Roger that. I thought I went through them all but obviously didn't.

Its seems that I may have brought this whole mess upon myself, hard to think 1/10th of a mm could do that to me but it probably is so.

Thanks again and I will def give you some feedback once I make some progress on this.

[forddieseldoctor]

Don't worry I've been there done that. Sometimes it doesn't matter if you have the correct socket. They round off anyway.