Hub Bolt Help!!!!
#1
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Join Date: May 2016
Location: Matthews, NC
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Year: 96
Model: Grand Cherokee (ZJ)
Engine: 5.2
Hub Bolt Help!!!!
Im changing out my axle assemblies and wheel bearings. I can not get the hub bolt off for the life of me. I have soaked it for days with pb blaster and wd-40. I have a broker bar and a long steel pipe over it making it longer. I can not get it to budge even a little bit! I am going to try a torch on it but wanted to see if there was something I was missing. I have a screw driver in the rotor so it won't turn. What else can I do? This is the third separate time I have tried this.
#3
Old fart with a wrench
LOTS OF HEAT! As long as you are replacing the hub as well, there is nothing you can damage with heat.
#4
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Year: 1999
Model: Cherokee
Engine: 4.0
LOL, I so feel your pain as my son and I just went through this 2 weekends ago in order to replace the upper and lower ball joints. 3 breaker bars later, a lot of heat and PB blaster, we got them off. We took care not to get too hot, didn't want to wick the grease from the hubs. What we found that worked...
Heat with MAP gas, get breaker bar on with cheater, put tension (260# body weight) on cheater and then smack socket with BFH.
Heat with MAP gas, get breaker bar on with cheater, put tension (260# body weight) on cheater and then smack socket with BFH.
#5
Old fart with a wrench
At a plant where I worked, we had to remove the flywheel from a large vertical punch press. It was secured with a nut with a 3" diameter thread and hadn't been off since it was built in 1925. The maintenance foreman locked the shaft with a block of steel in the gears, put a large wrench on the nut with a chainfall on the outer end, heated it with a 3" oxy bonnet torch until it was red hot, then sprayed it with a CO2 extinguisher. The nut cracked and turned. Everybody ran when the wrench came swinging on the chainfall! Surprisingly, the flywheel came off the shaft pretty easily. Of course, then the toolroom had to make a new nut!
Last edited by dave1123; 10-20-2017 at 01:41 AM.
#6
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Year: 1998
Model: Cherokee(XJ)
Engine: 4.0L
I am assuming you mean the axle shaft nut. not the 13mm headed hub/bearing unit bolts.
This is what it took to get mine off. put a pipe on the ratchet and jumped on it a few times
This is what it took to get mine off. put a pipe on the ratchet and jumped on it a few times
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#8
Senior Member
+1
When I removed my front axle nut, I slid a pipe ove my breaker bar, then used my massive torso to initiate the rotation.
When I removed my front axle nut, I slid a pipe ove my breaker bar, then used my massive torso to initiate the rotation.
#10
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Year: 96
Model: Grand Cherokee (ZJ)
Engine: 5.2
LOL, I so feel your pain as my son and I just went through this 2 weekends ago in order to replace the upper and lower ball joints. 3 breaker bars later, a lot of heat and PB blaster, we got them off. We took care not to get too hot, didn't want to wick the grease from the hubs. What we found that worked...
Heat with MAP gas, get breaker bar on with cheater, put tension (260# body weight) on cheater and then smack socket with BFH.
Heat with MAP gas, get breaker bar on with cheater, put tension (260# body weight) on cheater and then smack socket with BFH.
I picked up a torch from Lowes today. Not sure if the gas is MAP gas though. Im guessing it will say on it somewhere. Got the blue BernzOmatic can from Lowes
#12
Old fart with a wrench
YELLOW tank. With the blue one, you might as well use a cigarette lighter!
#13
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Year: 97
Model: Cherokee
Engine: 4.0
Seriously... If you still can't get it loose, take it down to a shop and ask them if they would put a 3/4 drive impact on it for you to run it off for $20. Then put it back on just snug enough to get home and pull it back off by hand. I would do this in a heartbeat at my shop. It's a two minute 20 bucks.
These nuts and pinion nuts are WHY shops own 3/4 and 1 inch drive impacts.
These nuts and pinion nuts are WHY shops own 3/4 and 1 inch drive impacts.
#14
Old fart with a wrench
If you're running open wheels like trailertrash, he doesn't even have to put it on the lift.
#15
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Year: 97
Model: Cherokee
Engine: 4.0
Even if you have to pull the wheel out of the way yourself first, it's worth it. I stopped even trying to get these off any other way. My first thought is "Who's got an impact handy?" Guys at truck stops or tire shops are pretty good about helping with these kind of things.