Lotus: Lower LH inboard link bolt

My goal for yesterday was to finish as much as possible without the replacement bolt or tie rod bellows, to include painting the front of the frame. Didn't come close. I spent three hours getting the bolt out.

The process was simple. Put thick, oversize 0.5in. washer on first, so the force is applied to the tubing that the bolt passes through and not the frame. The tubing extends about 0.5in. from the frame. Add some 0.5in. drive sockets as spacers, one or more of those robust washers and a plain 0.5 x 20 nut. As the nut pulls tight the end of the bolt should be coming through; do not torque with less than a nut's thicknesses or the threads could be damaged. Tighten until about 0.5in. of thread extends, then disassemble and add more spacers.

I honestly thought I would only have to do this once or twice for the bolt to break free. It never did. I thought that the bolt would spin free, it never did. The torque was high enough to cause me to switch from a standard ratchet to one with a longer handle. Not that the force was really high, it was the repetition that was killing me.

I spent over three hours on this endeavor. Sure, some of that was spent searching for odd ball spacers -- an old ball bearing outer race worked well. Midway through, the bolt threads started to go bad and I had to clean them up with a die.

There was not much to make the bolt so tight. A grove where it extended from the frame. A little corrosion where the bushing went. It IS a precision fit, and maybe those things were enough. But I think the problem was the bend. This sifted the center of force well off center.

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