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Ooops. I meant to say exhaust header pipe and catalytic converter rather than exhaust manifold. Sorry for the screw-up.
Back from a 10 day absence due to an IRS audit. Less fun than working on a serious Honda problem, but successful nonetheless. I am trying to replace the passenger side CV Axle. My problem is that I cannot separate the intermediate axle from the CV-Axle on the passenger side. I guess I’m down to a few options short of failure. I have removed two of the three bolts holding the intermediate shaft to the engine, but cannot get the most outboard bolt loose. I assumed that if the bracket was removed, I would be able to take the intermediate shaft and stuck tulip out without too much difficulty. But there is not enough room to get a socket (even wobbler) into the area because of the stuck tulip and I can’t even get a 12 point wrench into this area, although I am not a fan of 12 point wrenches for stuck bolts. I can get an extended open end wrench in there, but there is not much room for excursion. I have soaked the bolt (again this morning) trying to get a mechanical advantage on the bolt, but I am afraid I may end up rounding the bolt head. Not good. The other option I suppose is to remove the exhaust manifold (if that is possible to remove by itself), but that seems risky to me as well, knowing how difficult it can be to loosen a bolt exposed to high heat. One particular question that I do have is: “what are the consequences of hitting the tulip with extreme force (provided I put the two intermediate shaft bracket bolts back in)?” I have tried the “popping” method without success and have used quite a bit of hammer force on the tulip using a long tapered punch, but without success. I will once again appreciate any suggestions. Thank you.
Thanks for the information DaFirnz. I’m getting ready to tackle that project in just a few minutes. I’m glad to hear the problem may not be my inadequate swing of the hammer. My question now is: should I replace the intermediate axle (366,000 miles on car) since it will be out of the car? Also, if not, are there any c-clips or seals that will need to be replaced? Thanks again for any additional input.
For what is is worth, I stumbled upon a very nice Power Point presentation for CV axles. It was a real education for me and I was happy to find it. Here is the link: http://www.teachercenter.e1b.org/cms/lib/NY19000451/…/110/fwd%20axle%20shafts.ppt
Since I was able to download this without incident and did not see any copyright disclosure information, I assume it is freely available on the internet for personal use. If in doubt, you may want to contact the school that authored it.
Yes, I believe I could get one of those in there, maybe even a tri-pod puller. But I’m struggling to see how this would work. Your additional comments would be appreciated.Thank you.
Thanks again for the replies. After doing some more research, I discovered that this is evidently a somewhat common problem and more than one video demonstrates homemade axle pullers. I was going to go down the muffler clamp road, bought the 2 1/2″ clamp and then decided to give the vice-grip method a try (from the youtube). Fortunately, it worked. For what it is worth, I purchased the Harbor Freight 2# puller kit and tweaked some parts for its use. The thread on the HF puller screw is M10 x 1.5. I started by slightly turning down (sanding) the knurling on the 10″, or so, vice-grip, then unscrewed the adjuster bolt it from the tool. I drilled a clearance hole for the threaded vice-grip bolt in the center of a 1/2″ water pipe cap and assembled that back together with the cap slid over the bolt. I could still turn the vice grip easy enough with the threads or the end of the bolt head (which was now hidden inside the water pipe cap). Then I attached a 10″, or so, length of 1/2″ water pipe and proceeded to add nipples and reducers to get to the M10 x 1.5 slide puller thread. I was able to cross-tap the last american size thread nipple adapter with an M10 x 1.5 tap and then screwed the slide puller onto the rig. I clamped the vice-grips onto the axle hub after the boot was removed and slide-hammered the axle hub out. After moving the vice-grip to the 3rd position on the hub, the hub came out. I did have to use some heavy knocks to get it out, but once it released, it came out easily. I’m not sure what the part I’m called the hub really is, but I hope you get the picture. My axle spline was stuck in the transmission (trans-axle); hence this problem. Not counting my trip to Harbor Freight, and Lowes, this adapter took me about 45 minutes to make. The total cost was about $30.00, not counting the vice-grips which I already had, but I feel it was well worth the money. Once attached to the axle hub, it took less than 5 minutes to get it released. Also, the Vice-Grip (brand name) did not come loose during the operation and nothing was used to keep it from popping open as the slide-hammer was used. I’ve attached a couple of photos for what it might be worth to someone. Thanks again for this forum and many cool videos that Eric and others make available on the internet.
Yes, there is a snap ring at the end of the spline. I google’d the topic again with some other key words and found several youtube videos about making or buying a pulling tool. I see that a slide hammer tool is available but I don’t see that tool sliding in behind the axle on my car. First there is little room to work and second it looks like it is tapered. If I were able to force that tool into the available “slot”, I think the axle would break loose without pulling, due to the taper of the tool. The other issue is that it appears that the slide tool has a force line that would actually tend to wedge the axle. That may not be a big issue, but in my mind a center line force should be used for such an event. That said, the home made tools that a couple of people have used look interesting. As they say, necessity is the mother of invention. In particular the welded muffler clamp looks like a cool idea. I think I will merge a couple of the videos and weld two struts using this idea and use a slide hammer. My axle is shot, so taking the boot off and exposing the metal for such an operation is not a problem. In the meantime, if there are other ideas, I’d sure like to hear about them. Thanks again.
