Throttle body rebuilding tip

[the_mork]

I just wanted to post a quick tip for those who are going to be rebuilding throttle bodies in the future. Many rebuilding guides suggest picking up and impact driver to get the shaft/plate screws out without stripping them. The reason that these screws are so hard to remove are that they are either loc-tited or peened so the easier solution to fixing these is just to warm them up.

It is simple to just use any regular cigarette lighter, hold the flame to the bottoms of the screws until the lighter starts to get warm or you can feel that the head on the other side of the shaft is hot. After that just screw them out with ease, and if they don't immediately come out use a handy heavy object to smack the screwdriver into the slots such as a ratchet or small hammer so that it gets a better bite. Don't forget to use loc-tite when putting your TB back together.

 

[sniver]

Plus the down side of the impact drivers are that you run the small risk of bending the shaft. Surprising how not to many seem to know about the natural enemy of loctite, fire! Ok its heat ,I know, but it didn't sounds as cool.

Why don't you write your own revised how-to? I'm sure it would be more useful there. Not b!tching, just a suggestion!

 

[snowborder714]

I can see how the lighter would help with threadlocker, but how would this help if they were peened? When I reinstall the shaft screws, I always use red threadlocker and peen the backs.

I find an impact driver very helpful and have never thought I would bend the shaft. I also use the impact driver on the FIAV screws as lately they've been more of a pain to remove!

 

[the_mork]

I would suspect a combination of improved malleability on the part of the screw and thermal expansion regarding the hole in the shaft.

I took out two screws without difficulty with the wrong size screwdriver because I was doing this away from my garage.

As for writing a how to or a few, there definitely is a need for a number of procedures but throttle body rebuilding isn't really one of them. The ones available are good enough. Now, anything automatic transmission related is worthless, except that I'll withhold judgment on the videos that IPT released because I haven't watched them, but I hear those at least are quite good. The shift kit install guides have led a decade of DSMers to take their valve bodies out wrong. I've tried to make so writeups but I've always ended up dealing with something else before I could finish them and life has a terrible tendency to get in the way of everything.