Tips and tricks thread

[Hoodoo Man]

Saw this on another forum and thought it would be worth both sharering the info and starting a thread. Not eveyone on her is The Kurt and knows these things...

Below is stolen from ENH. A word of waring is this concotion will degrade bushings and rubber gaskets/o-rings but appears to work quite a bit better than PB...

Just figured I would share my experience with a home brew penetrating oil I learned about on the web. Long story short I have a very stubborn body mount bolt on my jeep that needs to come out. I tried everything I had in the garage...wd40, pb plaster, 'free' by some commercial company, even tried heating the capture plate to expand it and squirted some fluid film on it. Nothing worked. So while trying to figure out a way to get this bolt out I came across a formula for a diy penetrating oil. A 50 50 mix of atf and acetone. Put some in a spray bottle and squirted some on the bolt and waited about 15 minutes. After a little back and forth action with a wrench, much to my surprise, the bolt actually started to move! I resprayed the bolt again in hopes that more of the mix will work down the bolt and I'll be able to buzz the bolt out with my electric impact. I'll report back with my findings. Just figured living up here in the rust belt, every little trick up your sleeve to get rusted stuff loose helps!

[Hoodoo Man]

A trick I have been using for years that often works nicely with non-ferrous screws (non magnetic) is to put a piece of plastic between the screw driver or bit and the screw or bolt you are using. This will help keep the screw (or bolt) from falling out when you are holding the screwdriver at an angle or horizontally. It works with metal screws too but its easier to magnetize the driver for those screws.

What else have ya got for tips and ticks?

[Frank]

I have found a couple over the weeks Ive been fixing things. One of the best ones is free ! Free is Good. When running a wire through the firewall or any other metal structure, you want to protect the wire from chaffing . You can go to the store and buy rubber grommets orrrrrrrrr. Go to a local tire place and walk the parking lot outside the work bays . They cut off the valve stems they are replacing . It forms a perfect heavy duty grommet. Just as when they pull it into a rim , you just squeeze it into the hole and run the wire through it . There are different diameters too. As long as they have cut it above the second (outside lip) its usable . The other free part of this venture would be how many valve caps in the yard that are still good. Everyone has one missing right ? Brought to you by a cheap suckah ! FjR68