Dear Car Talk: I ’ve got a 4-cylinder 2007 Honda Accord with an over-torqued oil drain plug bolt that I can’t get out.
The bolt is not rounded but the threads appear to be stripped as I cannot back the bolt out.
I can turn the bolt, but the threads don’t grab. I’ve tried pulling back on the bolt with vise grips while trying to back it out. I’ve tried applying outward pressure on the bolt by wedging a screwdriver between it and the oil pan while I rotate the bolt counterclockwise. Neither of those things works.
Do I just need to take off the oil pan? Or is there still a way to get the bolt out without removing the oil pan? -- Josh I’ll skip over the part of my answer where I chastise you for over tightening the bolt and stripping it in the first place, Josh. You’re clearly suffering enough already. And you’re on the right track, in terms of getting the plug out. But in my experience, it’s really a two-person operation.
One person grabs the bolt with a pair of vice grips and pulls down.
At the same time, the other person exerts downward pressure on the bolt by wedging a large, flat screwdriver in there and twisting the screwdriver to separate the plug from the pan.
You have to hope you can work the thing out. If you do, you can then go out and buy an oil plug repair kit. With the repair kit, you can drill a new, larger hole in the oil pan and then you’ll use the tap they give you to tap new threads in that hole.
The new drain plug that comes with the kit will screw into those new threads.
If you can’t manage to get the plug out, you can always go to a local repair shop and plead stupidity. In fact, you might just want to go straight to that step and skip the part where you screw up the repair, too.
If you came into our shop, we’d kid you about over tightening the plug, but then we’d do our best to help you out. It’s also easier when you can put the car up on a lift -- and let a guy named Mongo hang from the plug with his vice grips.
Honestly, I’d consider just waving the white flag now and taking it to a shop. They can remove the old plug and handle the repair or, even better, replace the oil pan, which is really the safest way to fix this, Josh.