Using a Torch

Maintenance/Repairs
41

TwinTurbo:

No tough guy here. I’m 5-11 160lbs soaking wet, but I played classical guitar for 10 years as a kid and at least that made my hands rugged. And I AM a pretty nice guy, but this really angered me because it was so ignorant! I certainly would never have done such a thing - especially on a totally cleared lot! The homeowner across the street (who looked me up because she couldn’t stand the sight of the massive root system facing her front door) was the one who saw the whole thing go down. And so I was able to (very nicely) questiion the homeowner about it, but he was Asian and pretended not to speak English. And the lot clearer, who was known for land work in this subdivision for ALL builders, stopped short of admitting guilt.

Oh - and I mis-spoke about the saw. I couldn’t find a bowsaw big enough to get through the diameter of the tree, so I just used a straight saw. Man, it was S-L-O-W goin’ at the base of that tree!

Bing:

Maybe I’m just being a bit overly cautious here. Since I’m not a mechanic, most everything I do on my cars is a first-time experience for me. Turning wrenches is one thing. Creating sparks near flammable gases and liquids is another. It’s always amazed me when I see some guy welding underneath a car near the fuel tank. I guess if you know what you’re doing, it’s no big deal, but to me it looks crazy!

And I thought of renting the chainsaw, but I’ve never used one before, so I just passed on that. Besides - I thought I might drum up some sympathy hand-cutting that tree in the middle of a Carolina summer. It was in the 90’s with the usual high humidity here. That’s why it took me four weekends. I could only stand it out ther long enough to cut a few sections per week.

asemaster:

Don’t worry - if Harbor Fake sold a knight’s armor, I’d be wearing that! Hey … what about a crow’s foot to remove those firewall nuts, but with a 6-point closed box wrench design?? Something like that on a universal would probably work, too. Do they make such a tool?

42

Since you don’t appear to like Harbor Freight, here’s a vendor of more durable products that makes what you’re looking for.

http://buy1.snapon.com/catalog/item.asp?P65=&tool=all&item_ID=646914&group_ID=674852&store=snapon-store&dir=catalog

43

LOL!
After seeing the $191.95 for a set of crawfeet, I bet he likes harbor freight just fine.

I wouldn’t trust HF impact sockets, tho. Mine at Matco.

44

HF requires judicious shopping. For shop supplies and light-duty hand tools, they’re great. Some of the larger equipment is fine too. I wouldn’t trust high-load stuff like impact sockets either, and if it says “Chicago Electric” on it, I pass. I suspect those guys are a fully owned subsidiary of Lucas.

45

Actuallly, I like HF. There really aren’t many places where the average Joe can just stop by and pick up tools like a gantry crane, an air jack, or a grit blaster cabinet. Industrial catalogs are readily available to those working in the field, but not to the general public.

We have a place in Hooksett called R&R Public Wholesalers that I’m addicted to, but until HF opened their store in Nashua just recently there was no place else.

46

Let’s not hate on Harbor Fake too much. I have the electric impact wrench and the deep impact sockets. I’m not a daily user of it but it did a great job pulling though lugs on an axle that I purchased that didn’t have them installed. It can’t be beat for approx $40…and especially since i have no access to air compressor and not ready to make that investment. electric chicago brand worked extremely well. and I saved money.

47

Oh, I’m not hating on HF - just certain tools by them I’d stay away from. Sockets are probably not that great. I had one socket explode on me with my impact gun. Their gear pullers work but I’ve snapped several already but they take stuff back if it still looks shiny.

They large tools are hard to beat. You couldn’t make it for the money.
For instance, when I needed a bearing pressed out, I was quoted $120 by a machine shop - “Integra bearings are difficult”, the guy told me, thinking I fell off the turnip truck yesterday.
So instead got an HF 20 ton press for $140 when it was on sale. They even let me use another 20% coupon. Can’t beat it.

Got an engine crane, engine stand, sheet metal brake, shrinker/stretcher and stand, motor cycle lift, transmission lift, bead roller, planishing hammer and stand, English wheel – all for a fraction of the price of what they’d cost anywhere else. They all work well.
Too bad they aren’t made in the US, tho.

48

Northern tool is another good place to find budget tools. Especially the seldom used big stuff as others pointed out.

Miss having Fleet/Farm nearby…

49

I ended up cutting off the downstream stripped nuts with a simple hacksaw, hammer, and punch, and I returned the Harbor Fake cutting tool and discs unopened. Took about an hour. Not too bad. I figured I’d try the brute force method before using the cutting tool that I might never use again for a L-O-N-G time. The nuts were kind of diagonal on the flange, so the lower one had better access while the upper one only allowed about 3" of sawing distance with the full-sized hacksaw.

Then I was able to get one of the firewall-side Y-pipe flange nuts off with the Harbor Fake 15mm deep socket attached to a universal adapter and a couple of 6-7" extensions (one being a wobbler). Again - not too bad. But I couldn’t get that last (passenger-side) nut on this same flange, so I’m temporarily defeated again! Found a 1/4" drive 15mm deep socket that was only about 2.25" long at AutoZone ($3.99) and I’m hoping a 1/4" universal added to it together with those long extensions will get that one off (as soon as the cold rain stops).

In my travels to find that smaller 15mm socket, I noticed the following:

1.) Sears didn’t have a 15mm deep Craftsman socket in stock. And it looks like they’re stocking fewer hand tools now. Lots of theft of individual sockets out of sets. Even Harbor Fake has this covered by making the packaging go THRU the socket (which makes it harder to yank out)!

2.) Lowe’s is terrible for individual sockets !!! They have what LOOKS like a nice display of them, but they’re almost ALL 12-point (which I refuse to buy)!! Really annoying !!! They did not have a 15mm 6pt deep socket and almost ALL of their 6 pt sockets were in the smaller sizes !

3.) Harbor Fake stocks very few single sockets - most of which were out of stock. Also - there are apparently TWO lines of impact sockets. Maybe the “Pro” line doesn’t explode on you ??

4.) Advance Auto’s socket section is embarrassingly bad. Online you can order SK, K Tool International (is that brand any good?) and others, but you have to wait for that. And some items must be shipped to your house, so you have to add shipping cost!

5.) Home Depot’s socket section is even worse than Advance Auto’s. Very poor.

6.) AutoZone has a VERY GOOD socket section !! They sell a wide selection of individual sockets, all arranged by size with the 1/4", 3/8", 1/2", and 1" drive sizes grouped together for each size socket. I bought an 18mm Duralast socket once before and it appeared to be of very good quality, but this 15mm socket I bought has that cheap Chinese look with the shiny chrome exterior. Hope it does the job…

50
Sears didn't have a 15mm deep Craftsman socket in stock. And it looks like they're stocking fewer hand tools now. Lots of theft of individual sockets out of sets.

The Sears closest to me…has a huge hand tool section. No problem getting any individual sockets.

51

+1 Nor mine. They have everything, both the tool center and the regular retail store.

Sears is pretty good. The price is certainly hard to beat for a shady tree mechanic.
One thing I wish for is that the sockets are a little less fat. They are sometimes difficult to get in tight places.

52

MikeInNH and RemcoW:

Well, it may just be this store near me. All the hand tools at my Sears store USED to be across the long front wall near the door - and I was always able to find what I needed, but they recently did a ‘reset’ and moved everything to an shorter aisle that is more visible from the register area (and walkway) - probably to discourage theft. To me it looks like a lot less volume (at least for sockets), and they put all the sockets down at ankle-level instead of eye-level like they were before (which is pretty stupid, in my opinion). Maybe there’s actually MORE theft now then there was before and that’s why it looked so barren.

53
shorter aisle

Your Sears has ONE isle of tools. The one closest to me has 10 isles. The Sears Hardware stores have even a bigger selection. Especially things like tool chests. Last time was in their Hardware store…they must have had 30 different tool chests on display and in stock.

54

Same here. Ours even has a very good metric hardware section.

Btw, if you have a sears outlet or a service center nearby, they often sell stuff that’s discontinued or incomplete. Especially tool boxes (the deeper, more useful ones) are a very good deal there.
The prices aren’t written in stone so there’s a lot of latitude given to their managers.
You can get decent tools for about 1/4 their price.

55

Ace Hardware used to carry the SK I think and seemed to be ok tools. Now they carry the Sears line but around here the selection seems to be really limited. The farm stores seem to have a decent mix yet and you might want to try a NAPA for the specialty tools.

I would question whether or not a 1/4" is going to do the job if the nut was on there hard enough to get rounded. Sometimes you just have to make your own specialty tools. Grinding the socket thinner, welding a nut on the socket for a better grip, etc. etc.

I really hope he can get this last nut off and then talk about how to reassemble again.

56
"I really hope he can get this last nut off and then talk about how to reassemble again. "

Lol - so we can talk him into getting more exotic tools.

57

Sears in Manchester NH is much better stocked in woodworking tools than in automotive tools. They have the basics, but Harbor Freight and R&R Public Wholesalers have far, far more for the mechanics’ use. And it’s always cheaper.

58

MikeInNH:

It’s more than one aisle. They had all the sockets and mechanics hand tools along the long front wall and then a handful of aisles running perpendicular into this. It looks like they just pulled all the sockets and hand tools off this wall and swung it over to a short aisle right in line with the customer walkway. Looks like lesser volume to me, but maybe it’s just an illusion. One clerk claimed there was actually MORE stuff now, but maybe it’s more of something else and less mechanics hand tools.

RemcoW:

No Sears outlet store here, but I’ve been in one in MA when I visit my parents. And this store has service BAYS, but not like I remember in MA where that Sears had a separate building for service which had it’s own front-end store. Everything is scaled back here due to the demographics. Best Buy and Dick’s moved into the Mall, but they’re smaller footprint stores than I’ve been in up in MA.

Bing:

Forgot all about Ace, but I DID try Napa and CarQuest. As for the stripped nuts, those were on the exhaust downstream. The nuts on the flanges near the manifold have NOT stripped (yet) not have they required much torque to break free. So I’m hoping the 1/4" will work.

Sorry to drag this out on you guys. But it’ll get more interesting as it goes along.

59

Well, I got the Y-pipe off yesterday. The 1/4" socket + universal and extensions did the trick to get that last firewall flange nut off. Just like the two front flange nuts, not a lot of torque required to break it free. As for the O2 sensors, I only removed the one at the very front and just unplugged the other three (although it wasn’t easy trying to get the two plugs right at the base of the firewall for the two downstream sensors). Also didn’t see that hidden 8th nut near the passenger-side CV axle. Someone had posted somewhere that there were only 7 nuts (or bolts) to be removed, but it turned out there were actually 8: 2 front flange, 2 firewall-side flange, 2 mid-exhaust, 1 transmission pan bolt, 1 CV axle nut.

So, calendar-wise, it’s been a couple of weekends so far, but I think I’ve only actually WORKED on the car about 2 hours or so. Most of the time has been spent looking (and driving around) for tools. Also got called into work Friday for an Emergency that broke up my day.

Hopefully I’ll make some more progress today (if the phone doesn’t ring).

60

Seems As Though I Remember That When I Worked At Volkswagen, Years Ago (Think Air-Cooled), Exhaust System Nuts Were Made With Heli-Coils In Them. They Torqued Down Fine And When Removing Rusted-On Nuts, The Rusty Heli-Coils Would Just Break Up, Protecting The Studs From Damage.

Guys, remember those ? Are these still in use on any cars ?

CSA