Thread: Stuck screw help!!!!

If possible ... I would angle grind off the bolt head or the nut and just replace them when its time for reassembly.

Gregf

Yeah, I wondered about that. think I'm out of grinder disks but might be worth doing some shopping. The heads are countersunk so I'd be taking away a decent amount of wood and it would look a bit ugly - but it's only a fence

In that case i would sink a small pilot hole into the centre ... and then a drill bit large enough to take off the head .. slide the timber off the 'headless' screw or bolt ... and then you can remove it with footprints or multigrips.

Hard to know exactly without seeing it.

Greg

Ooooh, good idea. A bit of work but hopefully not too much. MIght need to sharpen a few bits, but that's doable.

Just curious... when you used the impact driver, did you try alternating tightening with the unscrewing a few times?

Surprisingly, this often works with old screws & bolts in timber. I'm guessing that it's easier to 'break the seal' - as it were - when tightening than vice-versa.

I kind of did. Finger slipped on the direction lever by mistake.

You might find that they are a bit hard to drill out I think the grinder might be the best option.
Regards Rod.

Have you tried a manual impact screwdriver, the kind you whack with a 2lb hammer?

You can buy allen keys that fit a socket ratchet or flex bar. My thinking though would be that if they are that tight then there is a big chance they will break. I doubt the average impact gun would have enough grunt to loosen them.

Fences are often built using green timber. When the timber dries it shrinks. So too do the holes the screws go through, which means they become extremely tight. This shrinkage principle is used when building log homes were reinforcing bar is driven through holes in the logs to fasten them. As the logs shrink they remain suspended on the bars rather than the whole wall shrinking downwards which would cause problems with the roof. Even if you remove the head from the screws you may well find the grip of the timber to the screw shank far too great to move. Tension can be relieved by drilling a small diameter hole through the timber rail hard against the screw shank. Sometimes more than one hole is required.

Yeah, tried drilling the heads today. Even with heaps of oil to cool it the timber started to catch on fire. Not exactly ideal. I think I will just cut it off. My wife suggested gang nail plates then to put it back up. I might try that - or just replace the rails if I need to

If you have a small propane torch, you could try heating it as much as possible then letting it cool before trying to shift it. No guarantees, but if all else fails...

The timber shouldn't get hot because you are drilling coach bolt/screws ? Your drill must be blunt.

opps ... OK I just realised the 'screw' your talking about ... has an Allen Key head ..called a hex-drive. In which case the head is hardened.

Can you overtighten them so that they either pull thru or break the heads off ?

Alternatively, instead of banging the hex key with a hammer, fit an arm/lever to it, like the ring on the end of a 12" shifter and slowly try to turn it that way

Greg

Ended up cutting the rails off. There is a large cutout in the fence to accommodate the tree that is on the fenceline which is being removed, which is why the fence needed to be temporarily removed. I was going to have to rebuild the fence in time to remove the cutout, but was hoping that it could be a later job with everything else that's going on at the moment. Looks like it might have to be a sooner job. At least there is enough overlap that I can prop it in place temporarily until I can get to it.