blue04rx

First off I would like to say that this forum has been very helpful to me. I have had my car since 2004 and have put 20000 miles on it with no major problems and the minor problems did not worry me because I knew exactly what was going on due to this forum (ex. White milky substance on the dipstick). One of these minor problems is rust on the wheel hubs. I was planning on painting my hubs, so I cleaned the hub and tried to take the brake rotor off to make it easer to paint. The first screw came off fine but the second one was locked in place and eventually stripped. I don’t know where to go from here, call the dealer? Take it to a shop? Wait till I need to get new rotors? Any suggestions would be appreciated thanks.

blue04rx

pic

expo1

Happend to me. I drilled out the busted screw and got a new, better one from a local auto parts store. It was in the isle with the " Help Parts " Use the hole from the screw you removed and pick a drill bit just a little smaller. Once you drill out 98% of the screw the rest will pop out. When you put the screw back use Anti-Seize on the threads and get an impact screwdriver.

BlueSky

You can get a dremel and slot it. Dremels are sold at any home improvement stores.

blue04rx

Thanks for the quick replies, i will try using the Dremmel and if that does not work i guess i have to drill.

Ericok

Don't know about the RX-8, but in many cars you can just use a punch and tap the broken bolt/stud out of the disc. All the other car's I've worked on, the wheel studs are really bolts that are just press fitted into the disc. When you put the replacement stud back in and tighten the wheel nut, it re-seats the new stud into place. Of course, you have to take the disc off to do this. I thought someone posted a DIY on this.

Coop '04

It's not a wheel stud it's one of the screws that they put on that holds the rotor in place. I didn't even put mine back in. It's not like the rotor is going to go anywhere once the lug nuts are tight.

Im_DANomite

iTrader: (1)

go to sears and find an extractor set. tap the extractor on the stripped screw and firmly tap on it with a hammer, at the same time, twist it loose. do this before you start drilling, dremeling, etc. etc.

ken-x8

I had exactly the same thing happen on a different (not RX-8) car. Screw would not come out. The problem was the tapered back of the screw head being frozen to the countersink in the rotor.

I got a drill the same size as the screw that did come out. Drilled just the depth of the head, used a drift punch to knock the head off. Once the rotor was off, I grabbed the rest of the screw with a pair of vise grips and unscrewed it. Not really tight in the hole: once tension was off it turned.

Put anti-seize on the back of the screw head, as well as on the threads. That's what sticks.

In a related thought, for those who don't adhere to the "Never oil lug nuts" rule, lubing the tapered seat is more important than lubing the threads.

Ken

corners

An "impact driver" will help you solve this problem in the future without stripping out the head. It is essentially a big screwdriver that you can hit with a hammer. Harbor Freight sells them for $12. They work very well.

Ericok

I can see that now. I should have paid more attention to the photo.

blue04rx

Thanks for all the help, i ended up buying a screw extractor set after trying to use my Dremel with no luck. The extractor got it out with a bit of force. Next to get painted is the caliper. I am just waiting on the rx-8 stencils from Polak Graphics.

Nubo

When using an extractor, pick the biggest one that will do the job. They are made out of very hard steel so they can bite into the screw. Unfortunately that makes them tend to be brittle. Too much torque and they snap and then you have the fun of having a stuck screw with an impossibly hard bit of metal stuck in the center. What makes this a b***h is that you're dealing with something whose torque requirements already exceeded the full thickness of the original fastener. The extractor is a crap shoot unless you've already done something to lower the friction (penetrating oil, heat, impact).

I don't know how many EZ-outs I broke off when I lived in salt country. In my experience it's better to try slotting first and save the extractor for a last resort.

Go48

As corners says, the impact driver is the tool of choice. You may even be able to get that munged up screw out with one if you do it correctly. Pre-set the driver, hold it very tightly against the screw and give the driver a hard whack with a hammer. Believe it or not, the screw will probably come out. Then you can replace it with a new screw. If you want to know what an impact driver looks like, do a search of the forum. I think I put up a picture of one the last time this came up.

EDIT: I did a search but didn't find the thread I thought I remembered. Anyway, go to the link below for an example:
http://store.summitracing.com/partde...5&autoview=sku

Razz1

You don't need to pull the rotors in order to paint the HUB Doh..............

Just mask oof the disc with painters tape.