Replace this bolt?

[Frank Lee]

My condolences.

[California98Civic]

Originally Posted by Frank Lee

My condolences.

You make it sound like a funeral! �� After mourning it yesterday a little like a death in the family, I am beginning to rally a little bit. There are two plans I'm considering. The first is to use just the one of the two mounting bolts for a little while until I get more time to pull the engine at least partially drill out and chase the threads in that hole. The second idea is a little better maybe in terms of durability. I could perhaps use something like Loctite or steel stick to just set a stud into the hole and secure the starter motor with a nut at the end. The first idea I saw on an on a Honda website, and the second was a suggestion of a good friend of mine with considerably more experience than I have.

Which idea would you prefer? I can see pluses and minuses to each strategy.

[Frank Lee]

Not being totally familiar with the set-up, I'd avoid using one bolt; things might shift and rip more stuff up.

Not a fan of glues and other band-aids either. Gotta drill it out and re-thread or Heli-Coil it.

[Gasoline Fumes]

I agree that one bolt is a bad idea.

Maybe try tapping threads into the trans case and use a shorter, but thicker bolt. Maybe 12mm or 7/16 threads? While the bolt should go into the engine block, I think it'll be OK if it doesn't. You'd probably have to enlarge the hole in the starter for the larger bolt.

Or have the broken bolt side of the starter welded to the trans case.

Or always park on a hill!

[Gasoline Fumes]

Originally Posted by California98Civic

The second idea is a little better maybe in terms of durability. I could perhaps use something like Loctite or steel stick to just set a stud into the hole and secure the starter motor with a nut at the end.

I don't know if adhesives alone would hold up very long. Another option might be drilling a hole from the top of the trans case through the stud and putting a small pin or bolt through the stud.

[California98Civic]

I appreciate the caution. I don't like the idea of a bandaid as any permanent fix, either. But this is my daily driving car and I need to have it back and I don't have time right now to get deeper into this whole thing with all the work and family demands upon me. ...so if I could get away with 2 or 4 months maybe bump starting the car on a hill every chance I get to minimize the starter use... that would be a really key Band-Aid right now!

So I've been looking into tests of these adhesives. The Permabond and Loctite products seem to be the strongest. I just need them to provide some assistance stability for this temporary fix. The real restraining bolt will have to be the other OEM bolt that is still good. Between the Band-Aid the OEM Bolt in the bracket that the motor is inserted through to the flywheel, I should have a lot of stability in the short-term and I can keep an eye on it.

But I ordered both replacement Bolts from Honda. If I have to I'm going to take this thing off the road for an extended period of time and drill out the rest of that bolt, Helicoil it, and install the replacement.

[HaroldinCR]

left hand drill bit if you can get to the bolt hole. Just might unscrew the broken piece.

[California98Civic]

Originally Posted by HaroldinCR

left hand drill bit if you can get to the bolt hole. Just might unscrew the broken piece.

There is no way to see into the hole in order to judge whether I'm drilling directly. I could easily ruin the threads or widen the hole. and even if I could go straight in without pulling the engine out of the engine bay, the bolt was fighting really madly badly when it broke. So I have to think that centimeter of threaded bolt that is stuck down there is in really hard. And I mean really hard.

[California98Civic]

A couple pictures of the 3-6 month temporary starter motor mount that I'm "fabricating." Here you can see the bolt I broke next to the stud and nut from which I'm making the replacement. I'm going to use Loctite Metal/Concrete adhesive to hold this stud into the transmission bellhousing and secure the starter motor in place with the nut. With a little trial and error I stepped up from the 10 mm OEM bolt size to this 7/16 stud size, which is equal to about 11.11 mm. It fits the hole for the OEM bolt almost snuggly so I'm hoping it'll let the adhesive make good contact with the bellhousing.

[California98Civic]

I test fit the new upper mounting bolt that I got from Honda yesterday, and applied a little anti seize to the threads. Good news. The upper mounting bolt slides in without any binding. So I proceeded to producing the lower mounting stud using the Loctite metal concrete and the stud that I got from the hardware store.