Rusted Bolt Trick

Haggis

Appalachian Ridgerunner
Here's a trick that an old time machinist tought us on how to free up stuck and rusted bolts. Take your cutting torch, proprane torch works too but on smaller bolts, and heat your frozen fastener or nut. Have ready at hand a parafin candle, the cheap table top ones work great, when the nut is hot enough to melt the wax (DO NOT HEAT THE NUT TO MUCH OR YOU WILL DESTROY THE TEMPER, GLOWING RED IS BAD!) jam the candle into the juncture of the nut and the threads while removing the flame. This will cause the wax to liquidfy and be drawn into the threads, thereby lubricating the inner threads and making removal much easier. The wax will not evaporate like rust solvents (WD-40, PB Blaster) will. This method has worked numerous times when we were running the sawmill and servicing our production equipment from removing wheel nuts from skidders to freeing up wood chipper clamp bolts. For some reason red candles allways seem to work better, but maybe that was just happenstance. Hope this might help you out of a fix some time.
 

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