Ok, so Saturday Gearhead and I (mostly him) cranked on the t-bars on my Edge.
When all of a sudden the socket spins around the head, no warning, no slipping before hand but now it's striped.
Has anyone else had this happen ? What did you do to fix it?

Thanks

 

You must have bottomed it out. It turns so hard to begin with, it could be hard to tell when you've bottomed out unless you check frequently. Mine are bottomed out now.

I would have thought the down pressure would help the remaining threads re-engage when you try to back it out.

Take off the cover around there and see what you can see.

Also, I split a socket doing it and it spun one time. Did you try another socket? Are you sure it's the bolt that's spinning? It's a 1/2" socket. A 13mm is too big and a 12 is pretty much too small on mine.

 

It's not bottomed out yet..
Ummm we used a 13mm. We did it in his garage and thats what he used. It worked perfectly on the passenger side. Maybe I will put it on some jack stands and see if I can back it out.

 

My socket worked perfectly for awhile, lol. Then one day it didn't. I put a 1/2" on it and it fit much better. I had just assumed it must be metric. If it is, it's off tolerance.

 

U can get it out by going to sears and I beleive they are called "bolt-out sockets". Just do a searhc online and you'll see what I'm tlaing about.

http://www.sears.com/sr/javasr/produ...eneral+Purpose

 

That's pretty nifty. I've never seen them before.

 

ive got a set of those... very handy :D

 

is it the head or the threads or your socket that stripped? that would be handy info as strong as those bolts SHOULD be, i bet it would strip the socket before the head, esp if its a 1/2 and youre using a 13mm. also it should be very difficult to strip those threads, i mean, if you think about it, those threads are holding all the weight of your front end...

 

That's what I think -- it's the socket (and as I posted previously) because I had that very problem (okay, so I'm a moron, sue me!)

I'm waiting to hear his results as well.

 

You sound like some of the mechanics I work with! Man, rollaway tool boxes practically the size of my truck!

Love to have all that but I'm just a shadetree mechanic. Mostly working in my driveway at night. My one neighbor saw me the other day and said, "what's wrong, John?" and I said, "nothing, just checking some stuff." Then he said, "no, I mean, how come your doing it in the daylight?!"

Funny guy.

 

omg.....i hope everything works out for u man!!!

only one more thing to scare me away from touching the t-bars...

 

if you're gonna crank the t-bar at least lift the front of your truck off the ground.

 

:Worthless

 

you really like those smiles...^^^ lol

 

YES!!! they are the best!!!

 

And yet, Ford's procedure specifically says NOT to do that, but I don't know why. It's never been a problem. There's no way you can strip those threads just adjusting them normally unless something else is wrong.