axel nuts removal

[jayshonda]

i've heard a number of posters saying how hard it is to remove the axel nuts. air hammers, etc. the absolute best method is to use a 3/4 breaker bar. no, you probably can't get one at autozone free rental. if you do your own work and own a 3 g or plan to own virtually any other car with front wheel drive, go to sears and buy a 3/4 breaker and the 3/4 drive socket.

next, go to home depot or someplace and get a 6 ft piece of pipe that will fit over the breaker handle. after bending the nut flange back, block the wheel with a brick or piece of wood. if you don't, the wheel will spin. yep, you can actually turn the wheel with the weight car sitting on the floor because it takes that much torque to loosen the nut. 6 ft pipe gives you plenty of leverage to turn the wheel.

if you get the heavy duty 1/2" breaker bar from autozone and do the same thing, you will take the breaker bar back in two pieces, as the drive will shear off. autozone doesn't charge you if you break it, but why bother? go get the 3/4" at sears or borrow one from a truck mechanic.

[YK86]

Yeah, I'll agree. I snapped 2 1/2" drive breaker bars before (both on cars that have never had the axle nut removed before). Both were covered by Craftsman lifetime warranty. I ended up borrowing a 3/4" last time.

[HostileJava]

I ended up cutting mine off. I sprayed it down and let it soak, but a socket and breaker bar on it, layed the end of the breaker bar against the garage floor, but the car in gear, revved it a bit and let the clutch out. The car started to lift up.

[Vanilla Sky]

when i did mine, i was lucky enough to have an impact wrench... twisted the old ones right off after i unstaked them... if you unstake them, it makes the whole ordeal less painful...

[YK86]

Impact was useless in my case. Same goes for the crank pulley bolt when i did a t-belt on my mom's 98 Accord. I think it was rated at 350ft/lbs. Piece of crap. The way it didn't do anything, it looks as if it was only putting out 10ft/lbs LOL. Surprisingly, even a heavy duty one at a shop near my place couldn't loosen it so the 3/4 breaker bar and pipe was my best friend.

[Vanilla Sky]

wow... i guess i was lucky then, eh?

i do love using a breaker bar in the junkyard... one time i had to use one with about a 10 foot piece of pipe (it was the shortest piece i could find, seriously)... with that much leverage, it was like turning off a hand tightened nut... ahh, the wonders of simple physics