Allen Screw head rounded

[giantsfan2575]

I have a new B4 that I got RTR, and when I went to change the motor I discovered that the head of the allen screw that holds the motor on was rounded. So, how in the heck do I get that sucker out of there without drilling?

[Budman_222]

If you have room, take a dremmel with a cut off blade on it and carefully cut a slot in the screw head. Then you can take it out with a flat tip screwdriver. Might want to take the spur off so you don't nick it.

[Duster_360]

That screw prob has loctite of some kind on it - try heating it up (hair dryer or heat gun) and use a brand new wrench which should fit a little tighter. Heat will soften the loctite (medium loctite) and you may get lucky.

If that doesn't help, try a drop of CA in the socket and use the same wrench again. Allow time for it to set, heat it back up and see if that helps.

I assume you can't get in there with a small pr of visegrips and clamp on the head? All you need to do is break it loose. Can you get on the head with a pr of needle nose pliers - get your strongest friend to see if he can break it loose.

Try slotting the head for a flat blade screwdriver somehow (dremel with a cutoff wheel). If nothing else works, you're going to have to either drill the head off or cut it off - not much choice. Good luck!

[Innovator]

Giantsfan,
Believe it or not I just came in from the shop where my task for tonight was to remove the allen screw that secures the motor in my son's T4. It too had a stripped head. As a note I don't use loctite on these screws. I first used a dremmel with a cut off blade to cut a slot to get a flat blade screw driver into. Unfortunately I couldn't get a good enough bite and that didn't work.

My next step was to use my dremmel with a grinding stone to 'slowly' grind the head off the screw. I was then able to remove the motor and remove the rest of the screw from the motor by unscrewing it with my fingers.

This is a very simple task but take your time and make sure you thoroughly clean away all the metal shavings you are going to leave behind.

As a note if you want to prevent this from happening in the future buy yourself a high quality set of allen wrenches like the Dynamite Machined Hex Drivers. I just bought a set yesterday and these are the best fitting allen drivers I have ever used.

Good Luck!

[Grant Tokumi]

Were you aware that the screws holding the motor to the chassis are not the standard 4-40 screws that are used on the rest of the vehicle? The 2 screws for the motor are metric so you need the correct "metric" hex driver to remove those screws. It is likely that you or previous owner used the 4-40 driver to remove that screw and stripped the screws out. Assuming that is the case, if you use the correct wrench, you might still have enough meat on that screw to be able to take that screw out without drilling, EZ-out, dremel slotting, etc.