threeoheight

Soooo I took my back hatch off my XJ and broke all 4 bolts that hold it to the hinges... The heads broke off flush. Now all I have are 4 studs sticking out of the fiberglass hatch. I know that the bolts go into a steel plate inside of the hatch because I drilled an inspection hole to see WTF is going on. How do I get these broken bolts out? I've tried PB Blaster and vice grips but they wont budge. I was thinking that maybe they're held in with epoxy or some sort of loctite so maybe heat will loosen them up or maybe weld a nut to the stud and try that. HALP!

kjc

Grind the end flat and center punch it. Get a small left fluted drill bit and use a reversible drill to drill it out. It works best if you use a small bit first, then a larger one once the hole is deep and centered. Make sure the bit is small enough that it doesn't damage the threads. Drill slowly and carefully so you don't break the bit off in there. Good luck.

4Birdman

Do you have enough space to weld a nut on the studs?

threeoheight

I tried to drill it to no avail. Then I tried welding a nut to it... Nut broke off... Then I tried a blowtorch and vise grips... Nothing. I drilled out the rivets that hold the plate to the inside of the hatch and knocked the plate into the door. I then drilled straight through the hatch and made 2 plates to sandwich the hatch. I'm running two 1/4" bolts through the plates and hatch and am going to bolt that to the hinges. I'll post pics when it's done. I think it will be stronger than the original setup and the bolts on the backside of the hatch might look cool too. What a pain in the ***...

kennzz05

i think i would have stopped at the first broken stud (removal wise)

threeoheight

Yeah that would have been the WISE thing to do, but Jack Daniels had other plans for me that night.