Stripped oil pan bolt

[craiggroves91]

Something always has to go wrong.
When changing the oil pan on my s52 to the e34 one of the oil pan bolts stripped.
Its one of the front timing cover ones. I think it happened cause I used a drill and went too much and its aluminum



what are my options?


Would it be fine to just go without it?

[F34R]

That is a bitch of a place to try and tap a new hole, find a longer tap and rethread it.

OR if the bolt will tighten up enough to hold in place just leave it in there and check it every other day. There is alot of bolts that hold that pan in place, new gasket and other ones tighten up proper will hold up fine.

You're not FI'd so I would not worry about it.

Any good shop can tap that for you under 30 bucks, should take only 5-10 minutes. If you were local I could tap it fast.

I took my tap and welded it to a 6" extension to use on a ratchet.

[craiggroves91]

That is a bitch of a place to try and tap a new hole, find a longer tap and rethread it.

OR if the bolt will tighten up enough to hold in place just leave it in there and check it every other day. There is alot of bolts that hold that pan in place, new gasket and other ones tighten up proper will hold up fine.

You're not FI'd so I would not worry about it.

Any good shop can tap that for you under 30 bucks, should take only 5-10 minutes. If you were local I could tap it fast.

I took my tap and welded it to a 6" extension to use on a ratchet.

I could take off the harmonic balancer and access it just find probably. Engine is on a stand so it makes it easier.

The threads are completely gone

[noid]

I would retap it, if you dont want to retap it then helicoil it.

[craiggroves91]

I would retap it, if you dont want to retap it then helicoil it.

Whatever is easiest! I'm assuming that would be a retag

[AndrewBird]

I would helicoil it. Then you still use the same size bolt and it's stronger then it would be without the insert.

[Pantless Spency]

just tap it by hand, use a chuck with adjustable leverage bar and do half turns.


easiest way to do it by far.

[F34R]

Did you get the fucking head on your e30 yet pantless? I swear to everything rare in the BMW world, if you don't in a week you should be banned for uselessness.

And way to go posting a useless comment that was posted at the start by me. Not promoting myself, seems like you don't read and just post dumb crap to get your post count up. Remember my advice? sign out of r3v, go do fucking work.

I could take off the harmonic balancer and access it just find probably. Engine is on a stand so it makes it easier.

The threads are completely gone

Don't go through all that, just get the proper size tap and rethread it. You can get taps that are plenty long enough to get the job done without removing all that. Good luck and keep us updated.

Since it is on stands, if you run into issues with the tap not clearing...just mail the tap and a 3" extension, I will weld it up for free. Least I can do to help out =)

[mikeedler]

this might sound dumb to you F34r, but how the hell do you tap a bolt hole that no longer has threads (or metal anymore to tap into?

to do it correctly, you are going to need to tap it to a larger size thread and pull the pan off to enlarge the hole in the pan. might have a bit of luck if you can find an SAE thread tap and make those threads SAE, and leave the pan on.

or JB weld a stud in there and use a nut-- its ony 8-10 nm tight.--might work.

[craiggroves91]

this might sound dumb to you F34r, but how the hell do you tap a bolt hole that no longer has threads (or metal anymore to tap into?

to do it correctly, you are going to need to tap it to a larger size thread and pull the pan off to enlarge the hole in the pan. might have a bit of luck if you can find an SAE thread tap and make those threads SAE, and leave the pan on.

or JB weld a stud in there and use a nut-- its ony 8-10 nm tight.--might work.

The plan was to just make it bigger. SAE or not
I just need something holding the oil pan to the block

[AndrewBird]

USE A THREADED INSERT.

You drill the hole bigger, thread it with an STI tap, the screw the insert in, giving you a threaded hole that is the original size. You do not need to pull the oil pan to do this.

[craiggroves91]

USE A THREADED INSERT.

You drill the hole bigger, thread it with an STI tap, the screw the insert in, giving you a threaded hole that is the original size. You do not need to pull the oil pan to do this.

Do they make thread insert kits?

[36brua]

Do they make thread insert kits?

yes go to orileys pep boys etc. buy a helicoil kit about $30.00 cant remember bolt size 6mm ? any way take a bolt with you . you will have to remove the pan ro properly drill and seat helicoil fix it now not later. GL

[craiggroves91]

yes go to orileys pep boys etc. buy a helicoil kit about $30.00 cant remember bolt size 6mm ? any way take a bolt with you . you will have to remove the pan ro properly drill and seat helicoil fix it now not later. GL

Removing the pan is no biggy! Its on a stand will only take a couple mins.

[MarshallM]

Clean the hole out as best you can, apply JB weld to a extra bolt, install bolt into hole. Wait a couple hours and back the bolt out quickly. 2 part epoxy putty works even better http://www.por15.com/EPOXY-PUTTY/productinfo/PU/ . Helicoil is the best but its just a pan bolt without much torque.