horrible stupid pinch bolts

**mrnice** · 17-07-2012,02:55 PM

Was doing a little pre-MOT stuff on my 2001 1.9tdi avant owned for 2 months, one thing was the n/s track rod end which had dangerous levels of play in the ball joint-

picked up a new one and planned to swap it in a morning, MOT was 3 days away but i didn't want to use the car with the dodgy TRE ball joint in the meantime (ive had one fail before and no steering is not fun).

The damn pinch bolt is the most seized thing i've ever experienced on a vehicle (and my previous cars, beetles, capris etc have been up to 40 year old rust buckets-changed suspension/steering components on them with less trouble).

I tried penetrating fluid, heat, cutting, bashing, swearing and storming off in a huff, nothing worked on that pinch bolt. The thing is now sitting sulking on the drive til I nurse it round to the garage for MOT. Bet my mechanic will be impressed at being left with the bashed stump of a bolt to remove.
I noted that the suspension seems to utilise many more of these abominable pinch bolts too. Boo.

I'm generally loving the car- comfy, spacious, economical not quite as slow as i expected but am surprised at some of the stupid bits of design/engineering on it. My previous car- e36 328i touring, was a piece of cake to work on in comparison.

Guess i'll be routinely cleaning and lubricating damn pinch bolts to prevent future headaches.

Thats all, hopefully a heads up to anyone else carrying out similar tasks!

**Sam** · 17-07-2012,03:29 PM

Heat, WD40, overnight soaking and ~2 hours, a 6lb lump hammer and a 12" punch was all mine (3BG Passat) took.

Those bolts are notoriously hard to remove.

Loads of different methods of removal documented online.

**Peter D** · 17-07-2012,05:01 PM

Audi/Vag even had a removal press tool designed to press the pinch bolt out in situ. Regards Peter

**Sam** · 17-07-2012,05:36 PM

VAS 6085 if my memory (and searching) serves me correctly - expensive piece of kit.

**mrnice** · 17-07-2012,08:19 PM

oh how i would've liked that on sunday...

**NickPicks** · 18-07-2012,09:50 AM

Why do you need to remove the pinch bolt to change the track rod end? I didn't when I did mine, although that was the offside - I'd have thought they were the same.

**mrnice** · 18-07-2012,11:29 AM

Weird, i don't know how you'd get a tre out without removing the bolt (it's the horizontal one that goes through the steering knuckle,). It passes through a 'notch' in the part of the tre that's inserted into the steering knuckle, preventing you from tapping it downwards and out (if that makes sense). Mines a 2001 reg facelift so maybe they changed it slightly (to make it more damn awkward)? Or maybe i'm missing a trick?, be interested to hear anyone else's experiences too, anyhow, mechanic has it now and it just passed MOT with the tre as advisory so i'm happy!

**NickPicks** · 18-07-2012,02:08 PM

Ah, sorry, I was thinking of the pinch bolt at the top of the suspension strut (commonly known as the notorious pinch bolt). On mine, the TRE pinch bolt came out with no problems - I must have been lucky.