2007
porsche 987.1
Rear left side
So, i went over a bit over a bump on the way home and i was going about 40 MPH. as soon as i went over the bump my car swerved to one side of the road and i heard a bang. Thankfully, no one was on the other side of the rode or else i would’ve hit them!
Immediately after the swerving, my car lost traction. when i accelerate in any gear, theres a loud noise and literally no traction. It feels like i’m sliding. i can accelerate and move forward but the rear has no grip/traction. if i turn, ill slide.
Looking at the car at home, i noticed that one of the support bars completely broke. Because of this, i was able to move the wheel up/down extremely easily. the other side is fine and i can’t move it at all. i’m assuming this is probably the cause.
The last screw is the one that snapped off, and i’ve tried drilling, extracting and everything you can think of to get it out. (it is the one all the way at the end, near the
quickjack
).
Any advice?? i’ve gotten most of the screw out but there’s still a bit left further up in the hole
Hmmm... and you feel above where it threads in? Any opening there that might line up with the threaded hole?
This is one of those "hard to say without being there" sort of things. There appears to be a slot in the casting above the screw, I wonder if the threaded hole the bolt goes into is open into that slot. If so - they might have allowed the elements to have their way with the bolt.
You mentioned drilling and other techniques you tried. Is there any of the bolt remaining above the surface is screws into? If so - a few options that a pro might try:
1. Weld a nut onto the remaining thread (leaving a slight gap to the casting it screws into.) This provides a way to apply torque to the broken bolt.
2. Heat - red hot sort of heat - can break or at least make it easier to break this sort of thing free. And some frequent soaking with Kroil or another reputable thread release agent (I'd suggest visiting projectfarm to find out what works best. I remember he did an amazing evaluation of almost everything on the market and some of the old standby's sucked. WD40 is not a penetrating oil.)
3. If none of these work, then you're facing drilling the entire bolt out, hopefully with a drill bit that won't quite reach the thread diameter, then pick out the remains of the bolt threads, and run a tap through to clean it up..
4. And if #3 doesn't work - then it's time for a bigger drill, and I'd try making some sort of template/guide to make sure the drill doesn't wander off the bolt (they love to do that, and happily munch up the softer metal the bolt is threaded into) - the get a Helicoil kit for that size bolt and go at it.
Most experienced mechanics face this sort of thing frequently, so they know all the techniques and tricks. It might be time to call on in and avoid making things worse (I did that once and it almost cost me an engine..)
thank you so much for your help!! unfortunately, i can’t see the top of the bolt because it’s behind the welded part of the car. I may bring it in to a shop. i attached a video (sorry if it’s hard to see
I think it's at the point where it would be wise to have an experienced mechanic with all the right tools look at it. They'll want to make up some sort of guide so they can drill a pilot hole right in the center of the bolt, and I think then drill oversize and
Helicoil
or equivalent the hole.
Good luck! Let us know how it works out.
If you end up the route that leads to overbore and
helicoil
look into time-serts before you make a decision. Search up induction heaters for broken hardware, I’ve never used one only seen them. They are available on
Amazon
for less than $200. I would be tempted to heat it and try tight vise grips to break it free after heat, one fortunate advantage you have is a lot of room around it and quite a bit of purchase to work with. Don’s idea is also a good one as experience is crucial and qualified mechanics are worth the coin, especially in circumstances such as these. You need drill press precision and that’s not possible with a hand held drill hence Don’s comment about wandering oblong.
i think i found the issue….. after i went over the bump, the loud bang was probably related to all of this coming apart. I have no clue where the bolts may have went or maybe they came off earlier?? I think all of this is definitely why right after the bump, my car swerved HARD to the left (all of this is on the rear left). it looks like the support isn’t connected to the subframe.
Wow.
Anyone done any suspension work there lately. It looks as if a good portion of your suspension wasn't tightened down. Wow.
Boris - if you check his video, he's past that point. He has partly drilled it out, but not all the way. No bolt to clamp onto. It needs a pilot hole through the rest of it, then drilled out to size for Timesert or
Helicoil
. (Either would be fine in this application.)
I had a difficult time seeing exactly what was going on in those videos. As for the “did it have suspension work”? The one thing I did notice in that video was that it had aftermarket pipes, and I wondered if somebody had loosened that assembly for whatever reason during the installation process. The roads in North Carolina are superior to the roads in New York in the spring all day every day and that’s just not an assembly you see come apart from vibration. Do you know if the car was ever in an accident?
