Son of a b**ch.....who designed the front bolt for the leaf springs. I have never seen such a ridiculous set up, with the nut "tack welded on". What kind of a moron idiot didn't know that it would rust all to hell and then break the tiny little nothing welds and just spin and spin and ...make me cuss more than I have in the last 10 years put together. Got the other side cut out...about a 2 hour job at the least. Now I can put the other side step bar on...Still have to cut open the frame rail to use another bolt/nut to reassemble...ugh. If I could get my hands on the little pencil necked accountant that cut a few cents out of the budget and used the idiot setup, instead of going all the way through the frame rail like other companies do....

 

Did you hit it with heat to free up the red Loctite they use there?

 

No, didn't know about that. I have to do it the hard way...

 

Even if you did it still doesn't mean you would have broken the welds on that nut.
20 something year old vehicles and all.
There is a fair amount of info on ways to handle that on the internet.

 

I watched some videos and it pretty much is how I did the other side. Nonsenical stuff just peezes me off. It would have been so much easier if it went all the way through the frame rail, with the nut on the backside. wrench to fit nut/socket for the head and wala. No problemo!!! lol

 

It works just fine if you use heat, as it was designed. That's what red Loctite is for.

 

And you risk burning the paint and undercoating around the bolt and it is a long way from the heat to the end where the hidden nut and red thread locker are. By the way, red Loctite needs to be at 500 degrees for a couple of minutes to soften. Then when you put it back together you have to get the bolt, preferably new with thread locker, torqued to spec to ensure it will not come lose. Another opportunity for trouble. I agree, not the best design.

I am slowly working on removing all the rear suspension bolts on my ’91 as part of a suspension replacement. So far one side done with nothing broken. Did not have to resort to use of heat yet but used lots of penetrating fluid for days ahead and worked the bolt back and forth, loosen then tighten until it ran free.

 

I run Fluid Film in the winter.
Come April I power wash it all off.
There are certain places that I reapply the Fluid Film in April After I power wash it off though.
For various reasons.
One is all my suspension bolts.
At some point I hope to duplicate an Up Country suspension on my '00.
So I have gotten into the habit of dousing the bolts with PB Blaster, I buy it by the gallon and use a spray bottle, and then "seal" it in with a good dousing of Fluid Film.
Where you guys will PB Blast for a few days, maybe a couple weeks, before you tackle a suspension I will have PB Blasted for a few years by the time I get to mine. LOL
Another place is bushing and the springs themselves. I find that it keeps the squeaking to a minimum.

 

I cut windows to better apply PB, heat and a wrench:

 

I'm currently searching the web for the largest bulk size of PB blaster I can purchase.

 

I buy my gallons at Home Depot. Cheaper then any where else.

https://www.homedepot.com/p/Blaster-...8-PB/205790776

And grab a couple dollar store spray bottles.
I say 2 cause they do kinda suck and want to stop working sometimes.

 

The real problem with those bolts isn't really the heating up or the nut welded in an inaccessible location, it's the damn rusting of the bolt to the bushing sleeve.

I spent several hours cutting my (probably original) springs out of my 95 and finally got to the bushing - split it off and then it's super easy to get heat on the bolt and get it out. I ended up not breaking any of the weld nuts.

If only burning undercoat was the only worry with heat in that area. For me it was worrying about starting a fire due to the fact that the floors right above the bracket were rotted. That led to the discovery that the entire cargo area was full of rot. So on top of the lengthy rear spring job, I ended up spending a lot of time on repairing and sealing the rotten cargo area floors.

I will say that re: the Fluid Film - I first learned of it on this forum and have been treating my XJ 2x a year since. It definitely seems to have kept the rust in check and prevented further rusting. The rust and rot are terrible around here due to the winter road salt. I believe it was Dave51 (definitely someone from CT) that had the coil spring perches rot out so badly he needed to completely replace them.

 

I got in on a deal on Amazon couple months back a whole case of it for $11.81 but of course does you no good...However try a 50/50 mix of auto transmission fluid and acetone it works dang good.

 

Many thousands of Jeep owners have had no such problems. It works fine.

 

Home Depot has a 55 gallon drum for $1048. https://www.homedepot.com/p/Blaster-...5-PB/205063590