How to Loosen a Rusted Bolt or Nut

Might just work for many situations. Last evening my brother and I struggled with getting a 1-1/4" steel nipple out of a tee fitting.
It would not come out and just bent in half with a pipe wrench. Ended up breaking off flush with the fitting.
Solution was to cut the remaining threads out with a hammer/chisel.

I would have liked to try this solution to see if it helped at all.
Next time I guess.

Heat, baby, heat. It works wonders.

Holy Cow, post: 436742, member: 50 wrote: Heat, baby, heat. It works wonders.

The welders called the acetylene torch a smoke wrench. 🙂

Learned as a kid from my dad that welders were great devices for loosening that which didn't want to be loosened. One trick was to use a carbon arc torch. A few seconds might do the job, depending on the size of the problem.

Holy Cow, post: 436792, member: 50 wrote: Learned as a kid from my dad that welders were great devices for loosening that which didn't want to be loosened. One trick was to use a carbon arc torch. A few seconds might do the job, depending on the size of the problem.

They had those back then?

Dad worked part time as a welder salesman around 1963-65. Forney welders. I witnessed many a sales demonstration.

Most required 220v but he did sell a few 110v models. There were still quite a few farms that only had 110v service. He would check out the power lines headed to the farmstead as he drove in.

Holy Cow, post: 436882, member: 50 wrote: Dad worked part time as a welder salesman around 1963-65. Forney welders. I witnessed many a sales demonstration.

Most required 220v but he did sell a few 110v models. There were still quite a few farms that only had 110v service. He would check out the power lines headed to the farmstead as he drove in.

Funny story from an old telephone lineman I worked with years ago. At the time he was with the Loyal Telephone Co. out of rural Mississippi. They had an intermittent problem with a lot of 60 cycle hum and crackling on the line. 60 cycle hum usually means a bad ground with the electric grid. He had climbed poles all over a thirty square mile area trying to "catch" this noise that everybody was complaining about. One hot afternoon in the bottomlands he heard the noise. It was awful. It would hum and crackle, then quit for a few minutes...then start back up again.

He was hanging by his belt on the pole intently listening to his handset and his eyes wandered to the horizon past the miles of cultivated fields....then he saw a bright blue flicker that stopped right when the noise stopped. In a moment the flickering light returned at the same time the noise on the line returned.

He finally figured out where he was seeing the light and drove there. It was a local farmer's barn. The old fella had built hisself an arc welder (courtesy Popular Mechanics Magazine). That was the arc he had been seeing from the top of the pole. Not having 220 available at the time the culprit had wired two 110 circuits together and "grounded" them to the telephone pole ground rod.

Being of a cantankerous age it was easier to get a lineman from the REC to come out and help him properly wire his welder than to ask him to stop. 😉

paden cash, post: 436886, member: 20 wrote: Being of a cantankerous age it was easier to get a lineman from the REC to come out and help him properly wire his welder than to ask him to stop.

F@#^@^ welders. Remember being told to move a welding ground further down the deck for a project. They conveniently forgot to tell me the welder was running and I thought I had been karate kicked on the inside of my arm, ribcage, and leg, all at once.

R.J. Schneider, post: 436909, member: 409 wrote: F@#^@^ welders. Remember being told to move a welding ground further down the deck for a project. They conveniently forgot to tell me the welder was running and I thought I had been karate kicked on the inside of my arm, ribcage, and leg, all at once.

I was working on a pipeline outside Houston in 1977. As they welded the pipe they would "dope and wrap" the joint. Before the pipe was buried they would "jeep" the joint to check for cracks in the insulation. The "jeep" was a wand with a box on top, a coil spring at one end of the wand and a trailing ground wire. I was asked to move the ground wire once. BAMMMM!!!! Have you ever grabbed the condenser on an automobile distributor? Same sensation.
Andy

Thanks Mr Cow for the OP.
I'm ALWAYS getting involved in "simple" mechanical projects...
This goes in my "arsenal".
N

Anybody notice his 4-way still has a price tag stuck on it? 😉

Nate The Surveyor, post: 437159, member: 291 wrote: This goes in my "arsenal".
N

I always keep this handy in case duck tape and a hammer don't work. 😉

FL/GA PLS., post: 437161, member: 379 wrote: I always keep this handy in case duck tape and a hammer don't work.

[SARCASM]You've mentioned that your spouse doesn't allow you to have tools. Surely she doesn't allow THAT.[/SARCASM]

Bill93, post: 437630, member: 87 wrote: You've mentioned that your spouse doesn't allow you to have tools. Surely she doesn't allow THAT

Only inside the house. Outside she doesn't care as long as I don't come into the house hemorrhaging. 😉

An alternative:

[MEDIA=youtube]9NTkb1nA3sQ[/MEDIA]

Andy Bruner, post: 436911, member: 1123 wrote: I was working on a pipeline outside Houston in 1977. As they welded the pipe they would "dope and wrap" the joint. Before the pipe was buried they would "jeep" the joint to check for cracks in the insulation. The "jeep" was a wand with a box on top, a coil spring at one end of the wand and a trailing ground wire. I was asked to move the ground wire once. BAMMMM!!!! Have you ever grabbed the condenser on an automobile distributor? Same sensation.
Andy

I had someone slip the trailing cable for the jeep in my back pocket once. Put me on my knees instantly.

[MEDIA=youtube]bR23H7ACnNY[/MEDIA]

Liquid Wrench was once a good product.
It has been reduced to an smelly oily substance compared to the original mixture.
When young, I remember dad dosing stuck tractor pistons and rusted threads day after day and letting the hot sun do the job.

Acetone (real fingernail polish remover) mixed 50/50 with ATF makes a pretty a good homemade "liquid wrench". I agree with Harris; they've changed up over the years.