In the process of taking out my rear seats.......i encountered a problem...

The screws that hold the seat belt guide on the back are stripped and i can't get them out........

i tried to just cut through the guides to slide the seat belt out, but it seems there is a metal piece in that is in the middle of the plastic....

My question what to do about the stripped screws?? Any ideas would be helpfull....

Thanks in advance

 

Thats the same piece Joe stripped out on the SS seats that I'm using now. He had to keep forcing different bits in and even tried allen head bits. HE used large sized ones and somehow got the piece out. HE took the seat out and drug it out of the car to get a better angle on the screw head. I wish the would not use torx screws and lock tight. If you can get enough clearance try using vice grips to bite down on the side of the head of the bolt, that may work. GM put lock tight or something on those things. Really stupid.

Worst case you can cut thru the guide with a cut off wheel on a dremel. Wear eye protection please. Metal in the eye sux.

 

Would drilling it out work?

The screw has a round head so the vice grips are kinda out of the question.....

Either drilling or cutting through the metal will probally happen......

 

just makes sure that the metal in the eye doesn't happen ... microscopic slivers in your cornea are no fun.

metalshop I + "just a quick milling " + heat dissipater liquid = OH F*CK THAT REEEEEEEEEEEEEALLY HURTS !!!

 

They make this thing made for such an occasion its called an easy out. all you do is drill a hole in the middle of the bolt and put the easy out inside and turn it coulter clockwise the bit bites on the sides and is reverse threaded so the harder you try and get it out the deeper it sinks and i have got many a nasy bolts out with them. you can purchase these at any fine automotive store.

 

Yeah easy outs work great. I tried them on a few hard things though, like seized adapter bolts and broke the easy out. No fun at all. In this situation they should work. Drill your hole. Insert easy out. You may tap it in with a hammer to be sure it bites. Put on a pair of vise grips, turn, and viola.

 

like the other person said - try an easy out... get a good quality one... not some cheap auto parts store bs. you could also get heavy duty cutters and snip the plastic or use a cut off wheel.

 

We broke some made by craftsman. How's that for a seriously tight bolt. No, I agree the auto part stores carry the crap ones.

 

damn! i think the ones i have my dad got from MAC or SNAP-ON, they've held up pretty good (knock on wood) sometimes what i do is take a diegrinder and grind a deep slit in the screw head (like a normal flathead screw) and use a flathead.... works great if you have the room to grind it out

 

I'm gonna go and get a dremel and just cut the damn seat belt guides off the seat........

I'll make sure to wear some goggles....

Thanks for all the ideas guys and girls.....