Front Brake Yoke Bolts

[HimBigChief]

Am I missing something obvious here, or is there an easier way to get the bloody torx yoke bolts out? I snapped a Halfords Professional T55 Torx bit yesterday, went and got it swapped at Halfords, came home (a round trip of 80 miles), put the replacement Torx bit in this morning and tried to undo the bolt again and snapped the Torx bit instantly! That means another 80 mile round trip to go and get ANOTHER replacement. I've managed to get one bolt undone properly, another one is most of the way out and has now got pretty much stuck good and proper. On the other side, one is slightly undone and I haven't managed to shift the final one yet. I've soaked all the bolts in 3in1 penetrating oil, and my intention is to replace the bloody things with proper hex bolts when I put it all back together again.

Does anyone have any hints, tips or suggestions on how to get the bloody things out? It took me a whole day to do the rear brakes last weekend, and it's already taken me longer than that to do the front brakes, which should only take an hour or so. I'm doing this on axle stands outside the house, so please take this into account with your suggestions. I may just put the old brakes back together, if I can shift the stuck bolt, to get the car mobile and then get it into a garage for them to get the bolts removed. I don't like being outdone though!

[steve_earwig]

What's a brake yoke? WHich bolts are you taking about here:

Do you mean these bolts 9? I guess you must do, so I presume you're changing the disks. It sounds like they're well frozen I guess leave them to soak (3in1? Why no WD?), failing that it's an impact wrench I'm afraid.

[HimBigChief]

3in1 and WD40 are more or less the same thing, just WD40 comes in the spray cans and 3in1 is pourable and more precise in the area you can put it. Yes, it's bolts number 9 on the diagram. I'm going to pick up 2 of the torx bits when I'm down there to try to make sure I can get them done.

Yep, changing discs and pads, like I said, done the rears last weekend, and got a bargain from eBay for a pair of brand new front discs for 99p and £6.99 courier charge, also got a full set of EBC Greenstuff pads for the front and rear for £30 delivered.

[steve_earwig]

I thought 3in1 was just light oil

[HimBigChief]

Dunno, either way it's 3in1'd and WD40'd up. Just waiting on the inlaws to get back with the wife's car so I can do the round trip back to Halfords again.

I'm going to get 2 torx bits while I'm down there just incase, but do you think I should get anything else?

[steve_earwig]

compressor and impact wrench? No idea what else would help, you can't use heat there, which is my usual standby. Can you get a set of moles round the head of the bolts at the same time? Then that might end up chewing the bolts beyond use, or worse still shearing them off...

[jasper5]

Get yourself an impact torx socket bit. they are much stronger like an impact socket for undoing wheel bolts with an air wrench.

[Doggy]

Jasper's right there - it's also worth trying to get a good quality impact bit, the best one you can get won't be much more and will usually be worth the difference.

Failing that a set of cobalt drills......

[swampyv6]

did you manage to sort it??

i had a similar problem with the bits braking on a berlingo of the in laws
the way i go them off was, get a long breaker bar with a 1/2 torx on the end and shock it up and down, didnt take long to shift it.

when you come to replace the bolts be carefulas you wont find them on the shelf at halfrauds, they are an m12 x 1.25 pitch which is very fine, i have a good supplier of such things and even they want me to buy boxes of 100 of the things !!
and peugeot charge a stupid amount for them.

if you change for a normal bolt please for your safety and that of those around use at least a 10.9 grade boltthey can be found on ebay in the correct sizes but at something like £4 a bolt!

[HimBigChief]

Got a 1/2" T55 socket and managed to get three of the botls out, but I can't even budge one, and have only succeeded in buggering up the torx head on the bolt. I've put the new stuff in on one side, and have put the old disc (which I couldn't get off) and pads back in the other side and I'm going to take it down to the local garage and see if they have any better luck with the windy gun. Hopefully they'll have some matching hex headed bolt which I can replace them with. It would seem that the reason that they have been difficult to get out, is that the previous person who did the front discs before I got the car decided in their infinate wisdom to absolutely smother the bolts with locking compound, hence they were more or less concreted in place.

Just waiting on the little one to wake up, then off to the local town/village we go...

[HimBigChief]

Success! The chap at the local garage lent me some stud extractors which you hammer on over the stuck nut and undo with with wrench, well it worked, but as I've buggered up the bolt so much I'm going to have to replace it. Copper greased them all up though so they're easier to remove next time, so that's all new brakes all round. One less job to worry about now.

[totaleclipse]

Success! The chap at the local garage lent me some stud extractors which you hammer on over the stuck nut and undo with with wrench,

exactly what i was going to suggest while reading thru this thread.