What a horrible Christmas eve last night. I got stuck in the garage after I snapped the hex flat head screw that holds the brake rotor to the hub. I tried to drill it out then use a an easy out from a kit that I had gotten from some cheapy store. The darn easy out broke right in the hole that I drilled inside the screw making any further drilling with Chinese bits impossible.
Each drill that I used wouldn't bite or simply snapped if I pushed forward a little. Oh, the easy out was made in China too.
I decided to drill on the side between the hub and the broken easy out. Once I got a hole through every other easy out I tried just got damaged. They all had immediate wear where the edge of the spirals just flattened. The darn things are made of SOFT steel, can you believe this shit?
I am so fkin livid right now!
I will be at it again after the kids settle down from tearing Christmas wrapping and the cats from rolling in catnip.
Vehicle: 2002 SLK 32 AMG, bone stock. 1987 190E 2.3-16 valve (destroyed). 1991 300CE, a work in progress.
Location: Near Washington, DC
Posts: 14,284
Don't be so cheap, first off get some decent tools, you need at least Cobalt drill bits to drill through high strength steel, and carbide to get through hardened steel.
If there are burrs on the easy outs, use a Dremel grinder to flatten them. A drift/punch to make a small divot in the metal. As stated above use GOOD drill bits and use transmission oil as a lubricant during drilling. Drip it on. then before you use the good easy out heat up the hole/broken bit a little with a propane torch. Wack the crap out of it with the drift too. It might loosen up the threads.
Good luck. The best thing to do is maybe take the whole thing off and bring it to a machine shop with a drill press and have it done right. It would be a shame if you blew the threads out.
Okay, here what I did:
This time I pulled the hub out by removing the front wheel bearings.
I put the hub on a drill press and drilled from the back as centered as possible.
Once through, I used a larger bit to thin out the material left against the threads wall.
I then used a chisel and collapsed the screw into itself and voila, I have a cleared hole but with some thread damage.
I am taking a break now but when I get back I am going to rethread the hole as gently as I can. Let's hope I find the right bit for that...
I managed to rethread the hub and the screw is going in without a problem. I just put some BLUE Loctite and I am letting dry. No red this time, just in case... (it came with the red stuff).
I am reusing the old screw and I don't think that's going to be a problem. Let's hope I don't end up seeing the 300TE wobbling to a catastrophe
That screw isn't really necessary since the rotor is ultimately held in place by the lug bolts. It just holds the rotor in place when the wheel is removed.
Then the wheel falls off, but the rotor will still remain there, since it's also retained by the floating caliper assembly. As a general rule I view the wheel falling off as a worse scenario than a brake rotor that isn't properly oriented afterwards.
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