Having issues with crank bolt. Its backed out 95+% of the way, now it just turns and turns and WONT come out! Does anyone have any sugestions? ALL help is welcome please!

 

Put something behind it (screwdriver or something to wedge it with) and then try to turn it.

 

We tried that, no luck with it. Tried the pully puller, and pulled it out against the bolt, but thats not enough. Any other ideas? Feels like its unthreaded, but something else is catching it???

 

Try driving a pickle fork behind it.

 

We backed the pully as far up against it as we could, trying to use it as leverage, but enstead once we turned the bolt a little it loosened up enough to just spin. now there is no room for anything to go behind

 

So you were trying to use a puller to extract the pulley while the bolt was still in?? I'm confused, of course, that's mainly because I'm half drunk.

If I'm picturing what you're doing correctly, it sounds like you may have galled the threads when you were pulling off the pulley by pressing against the bolt. If that's the case, you need a good set of vice grips and a hammer to whack the the hell out of them. Then you need a thread chase to clean up the crank snout.

 

Might try a slide hammer also.

 

Will that grip a crank bolt head, and is there anywhere to rent one?

 

You wont believe this, the bolt moves in and out/side to side, in every direction at least 1/8 - 1/4 in. yet will NOT come out!?!?

 

That's because a chunk of the threads are gone, wait til you get it out and take a look. Hope your crank is ok.

Who told you to leave the bolt in while removing the pulley?

 

Usually the slide hammer rod is threaded and comes with different things you can put on the end of it. There should be a flat hook like attachment that you can slide under the bolt head. This is normally used to pull bearing seals. You should be able to rent one from an Autoparts store, maybe even Checker/Kragen auto parts.

If you can't get the hook to hold, or can't push the pully back on far enough to make room for it, use the screw holder that comes with the slide hammer for pulling sheet metal. You could drill a small hole in the bolt head for the self tapping screw, or better yet if you have a MIG, just weld the screw to the bolt head.

 

How much damage could be done to the crank? anyother sugestions?

 

May be some damage to the threads inside the crank. Perhaps you can get a tap and clean it up though. Good luck man. Hate when **** goes wrong.

 

Thanks for the suggestions, we are still hoping for more though. By the way, we weren't trying to pull the pullley with the bolt still on. When we got to a point where the bolt stopped moving out we pulled the pulley up to the bolt to get leverage on it to keep prying. we can get a screwdriver between, but its as if there is threads missing in the area where we have play and still a couple threads at the very end that dont have anyway to start back to threading the rest of the way out. We probably need to find something that will grip around the bolt head and pull, or pry the bolt right out. Just rip it the h**l out of there and hopefully run a tap back through the crank.

 

I don't know if this is a good idea or not, but maybe heating up the crank snout? Do you have an impact gun on that bolt?

 

I dont really understand what happened??? Were you taking the bolt out and it just wouldnt come out anymore so you decided to pull the pulley off?? Did you press against the bolt with the puller when it was most of the way unthreaded? I always stick a sockect thats just the right size on the crank snout to put the puller up against. Sounds like the threads are FUBAR'd. Also, I certainly wouldnt go applying too much heat to the crank snout.

 

You can't use a puller puller to get the crank bolt out. This makes no sense at all! The puller has to PUSH against something in order to pull something. If you try to pull the pulley against the backside of the bolt to get it off, what is the pulley puller pushing against?? (the bolt head, duh!). You have to get the bolt completely out before attempting to use a puller on the pulley. The puller MUST push against the center of the crank snout (with the bolt removed) to pull it straight off.

A few questions:
Have you tried to screw the crank bolt back in?
Will it thread back into the crank?
What did you use to remove the crank bolt?

DO NOT use heat on the crank, bolt or pulley. this will only make it worse!!!

Don't take this the wrong way, but its amazing how something as simple as removing the crank bolt can turn into something so complicated.

 

OK still need more suggestions: how about cutting the bolt head off with a die grinder, then at least you will be able to get the pulley off, and maybe get a better look at what the problem is. After that you could carefully drill the bolt out. But if it were me, I still think I would try the slide hammer first. Like I said, if you can't grip the bolt head with anything, you can weld what ever you want to the bolt head. You could even weld a hook to it and attach a block & tackle or "come along" to the hook.

 

Pureevil, if your crank is damaged, I have one I can sell you...

 

Well I went over there today and after a little munipulation, removed the bolt. It took me all of about 5 min. I guess it just needed some time to sit overnight. lol Anyway the last 5-6 threads were completely gone and we did have to tap the crank threads. After we did that though everything went back together without a problem.