> What would a professional mechanic have done when faced with a similar
> situation? Would he have gone straight for the angle grinder as soon
> as he realised the bolt was stuck (knowing that he was likely to cause
> at least a small amount of damage to the wishbones)?
>From what I've seen, most professionals being paid to work on someone else's
car would go straight for the grinder. Might use an air powered die grinder
instead of an angle grinder <g>
> Or are there any
> tricks of the trade he would have tried first (other than soaking the
> thing in WD40, which I tried)? I can't believe that any half-way
> competent mechanic would have made such a big job of this as I did, and
> I would like to know what to do next time.
IMO, WD40 is a very poor penetrating oil (it's better for other things). My
personal favorite penetrating oil is PB Blaster, with Kroil a close second.
I've heard that SiliKroil is better yet, but haven't tried it. And, I've no
idea if any of these are available in the UK ...
http://www.kanolabs.com/
For stubborn cases, PB Blaster may take a long time to work. I've soaked
stuck fasteners for as much as a month, trying to remove them every few days
(and applying more PB Blaster), to have them finally come loose.
Randall
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