ughhh..i think i striped the oil pan plug...

[JAM]

ive done a lot of oil changes in my day. i felt pretty confidant doing it on my e30. well, i removed the drain plug, filter, ect... when i went to put the plug back on i noticed the threads seemed to thin out toward the top of the bolt. i put it in, and it just kept spinning. wtf.

where can i get a new drain plug? pref as cheap as pos. thanks.

jam

[golde30]

you mite have to helicoil that bitch.

[pe2one]

try putting another flat washer

[roundel]

oh.... and try a new oil pan!!!!! haha get one of those rubber marine plugs its ghetto, but oil changes take even less time. If all else fails, wine cork do it....do it............do it

oh but try some teflon tape, the plumbing stuff

[AndrewBird]

I would try Teflon tape and if that doesn't work, helicoil. If that fails, you need a new pan.

The problem with the helicoil is you will need to drill the pan a bit. This means you will get shavings in the pan. Which means to do it right, you should pull the pan to do it, which is a bitch.

[golde30]

^what he said.

when i stripped my pan threads on my old m20, i just bought a new pan and replaced the whole thing.

[JAM]

im pretty sure the pan threads are a-ok but the bolt itself seems to be threadless towards the top of the bolt. its weird.

fucking a. time to hit up the dealer :(

[e30s52]

dont do that! just helacoil it out then rinse it out really well in a solvent take that is what i did.

[VacMan]

Take the advice of someone who's had this happen. There are 2 cheap ways you can fix this.

Cheap #1 - Rubber fitall drain plug from NAPA. We have one of these in the IS we bought because the PO stripped the pan and the bolt was barely in there when we changed the oil. Hasn't leaked a drop, cost $5 for 2 of them.

Cheap #2 - You're looking for a "single oversized" drain bolt. It's slightly larger than stock but not a full size bigger, so it uses the existing threads that are left in your pan but still fits tightly. I found a place in Canada that sells them, and I think the one we need is around $15 plus shipping.

We went with the plug option because it was easy, cheap and effective. They work like a boat's drain plug. You jam them into the hole, then twist the thumbscrew in the middle to compress the rubber. It's worked awesome so far and I have no reason to believe it won't keep going as long as we own the car. If it was a more expensive car I'd pull the pan and helicoil it or replace it altogether, but for a $1000 car, the rubber drain plug does just fine.

Tim

[AlarmedBread]

Just retap the hole, use heavy grease, go slow, clean it out often and you will get minimal shavings in the pan.