egr removal bolt snapped ahhhhh

hi got a td5 soaked the bolts on the exhaust manifold for a week!!!! spent and hour back and forth and the bugger still snaps!!!!aaaaahhhhh nightmare.....
just wondered if any one knows how i could get a drill in there to drill it out??? its the lower bolt, and the flex pipe is still there as i didn't want to undo the top one just incase that snaps.... was thinking maybe angled drill and a extra long drill bit, as also the rad and head is in the way for a standard drill has anyone snapped these bolts and has any ideas please..

Best bet would be to spray the other bolt with loads of WD40 and leave it a few hours, Try again, you need to remove it, if you want a chance of getting the broken one out.

Then Remove the EGR fitting and hopfull you have a bit of stud from the bolt protroding if it snapped of near the top of the EGR fitting.

Spray the area with plently of WD40 and get yourself down to halfords or your local motor factors and get a stud removal tool



One like whats show in the picture is only a fiver from here VWP - tools 1

If the bolt broke close to the head, then you'll need some sort of screw extractor and you will need to drill a hole, so accress to drill needs to be planned

Good Luck

Christ, blanking mine off tomorrow... not exactly looking forward to it!

They need warming up. I'll never get them out otherwise, no point soaking them as the threads are inside manifold

all i can say is be gentle slowly back and fourth... donna how im going to drill mine out yet....

I know this may sound strange but Sometimes its best to slightly tighten the bolt up abd see if yoiu can here a click before untightening it. Plus always make sure you use the right sized socket for the nut, if you use one thats just a tad too big, you'll end up rounding the bolt head.

A long steel tube fitting over the rachet handle may give you an extra bit of leverage, remeber to just tighen it up a tad before unwinding it, you be suprised how easy it is then.

If you havn't got a ratchet and socket set the right size, then its best to use a Ring Spanner as opposed to a normal open end spanner as the force on a ring spanger is appled to all sides of the bolt head. Heat can be used to loosen the grip because the metal expands increasing the thread gap between the manifold and bolt and hopefully breaks the rusts grip. A gas welding set can be used or a blow torch but make sure you are not going to set fire to anything or cause damage. The nut can be heated to cherry red if necessary but this in not always required. I have used an electric hot air gun (paint stripper type) and this has helped to remove some stubborn nuts and bolts but it does require a lot more time to heat the metal.

Safety Tip: Be extremely careful with an open flame! Never use an open flame near a fuel or brake line. Flammable fluids and open flame don't mix. The flame will burn anything rubber it comes into contact with, including trim, seals, and wire sheathing. It will also ruin paint instantly.

OP has a TD5 so will use an allen key, that bottom bolt is a bitch!

you need a mini ratchet set with an extension and the hex key 5 or 6mm on a td5.

an angle drill may get in there, however, what is in the way is the egr flexable metal pipe to the inlet plenum, which you should be thinking about ditching anyway if you are blanking off.

thanks for the replies, batternberg yeah i will be ditching it just didn't really want to take the pipe off at the moment as its still on there with one bolt, was hoping to be able to drill the bottom one with it in situe so if i cant get it out least its still on there.....

Just soaked the bottom bolts in WD... going to take steering wheel off to straighten up steering in the meantime then have a go at getting those little buggers off!

Rezz said:

going to take steering wheel off to straighten up steering in the meantime then have a go at getting those little buggers off!

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make sure you pin your stering box then! stick a bolt up the backside of it from underneath, this should align dead center.

battenberg said:

make sure you pin your stering box then! stick a bolt up the backside of it from underneath, this should align dead center.

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Did not know that! where exactly? don't suppose you know what size the steering wheel boss nut is before i take airbag off?

I removed EGR last week. Remove the water hose just above it. I heated the manifold up with Oct accetiline. Got it glowing and they came straight out. There 6mm hex key. But yeah bottom bolt is a bitch, but use a extension and rachet and ull be fine

Oxy. Fooking predictive text is ****e!

Sorry for hijacking your thread jay, mine has just come off after a bit of a struggle.. blanking kit all fitted, what are folk using to plug the three connectors that are left open with? Also, was going to give my starter motor a wack while i was in there as it's sticking on start up, can i only get to that from underneath?

take the manifold off.

i was thinking that T1G up but i was thinking am i going to be opening up a bigger can of worms trying to get the manifold off with those bolts..

Warm the EGR bolts up. Buy a blow torch, otherwise they will snap as there only small m6 I think

Wish I had seen this thread before I started extracting the EGR manifold studs. I have had the same happen, the first bolt on the left side (nearest the engine) came out relatively easily with liberal usage of WD40 and slow careful tweaks of the ratchet.

The right hand side however sheared off with only minor pressure, despite trying to be careful. The EGR valve and the manifold pipe are now removed. Now I need to find a way to deal with the sheared off stud. It has sheared flush with the surface of the manifold so nothing to grab onto :-( and getting a drill in there in-situ looks like it will be challenging.

Have never drilled a bolt before, any advice? Or if you had this happen, how did you get it out?

Everyone is saying WD 40 but proper penetrating oil like plus gas is far better, WD is not a penetrating oil as such....

Mine came out without a problem but I did use coppaslip on the new ones when I put them in.....

Rezz said:

Did not know that! where exactly? don't suppose you know what size the steering wheel boss nut is before i take airbag off?

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It's on the arm that bolts onto the steering box there is a cutout which will line up with a hole in the underside of the steering box