dallasite21

I broke one of the bolts in my exhaust manifold. Luckily its one of the ones that secures the exhaust pipe to the manifold. Thats the good news. The bad nes is that I have now broken the extractor in it as well. The question is will a carbide bit be hard enough to drill through the extractor? I woudl really hate to have to take the manifold off because I fear more broken bolts. Any suggestions?

citcapp

Thats a tough one. Is both the bolt and the extractor broken off level with the surface or are one or both sticking above the surface? Sometimes you can welld a nut onto the broken part of the stuf if it is above the surface of the flange. heat up the nut and the stud with a torch and back it out. It will be almost impossible to drill out the extracor. You can also use a very small bit and drill very small holes around the edges of the stud until you can collapse the stud and get it out that way, also a tough job with the extractor in the way.

Coltonis

FWIW,

I'm guessing those bolt extractors are made from a metal very similar to thread taps. If thats the case, I highly doubt anything is going to be able to drill out the extractor. I once broke a tap off trying to thread a hole, I tried every kind of super-duper drill bit i could find. They all either just spun or walked and that was with a flat work piece on a drill press.

If it were me, i would take off the manifold straight away. Trying to fix it upside- down and backwards is just asking for trouble.

Eric Anderson

Pretty much the only way I have found To get a broken extractor drilled out is to come at it from the other side, the drill bit will spin it and push the broken piece out. About every exh. manifold bolt I've ever messed with had to be drilled out and retapped. FWIW the bolts going into the heads seem to cooperate alot better than the bolts into the manifolds

Olds64

You might have to blast it out with a torch and reweld the manifold. Then you can drill it and tap it.

nukesec1

Good advice above. Do yourself a favor and just take it off to deal with the issue. The price, pain, and time spent trying to do it while on the vehicle is not worth it. I've been there!

2blu442

Or if it's a common manifold like the small block 1,4 or 5 replace it and save yourself the frustration! That's what I did last time I was in this pickle!