[simpson5774]

Well its been awhile since I have been around these parts, so hi again.

Well yesterday my brother tells me that he hears a noise with the car, something different than before, and something just doesn't feel right. I take it out, thinking that my rack and pinion is going or i had another broken ball joint (replaced both of them last year), but this time I was getting acute torque steer, which wouldnt be a symtom of a ball joint. come to find out I snapped a rear subframe bolt.

The bolt didnt look that rusted But the cup mount (which I figure is supposed to be attached to the body) had snapped off, and the metal ring inside looked so bent that you could almost fit 3 bolts in parallel, maybe thats why my alignment has been off. But the bolt snapped in such a way that it snapped inside of the ring which is inside the body structure. so some kind of mean stress over time fractured this bolt. The body struture underneath looks like it just has a touch of surface rust, but nothing catostrophic, but my problem is, it appears that this cage nut cant be removed to replace it without cutting a hole into the interior floor pan. Am I right in thinking this?

I am not necessarily opposed to doing that kind of mod to this beast, but someone please tell me that there is a better way.

 

[swapped]

you got a pic of this? its really hard for me to imagine what you are trying to describe....

 

[simpson5774]

Alrite, I tried to get some pics, not the best of angle or lighting conditions. I hope this helps.

 

[swapped]

WOW! that really sucks!!! Believe it or not I had something similar happen to me on a 90 Buick Regal. The setup is a bit different. What I ended up doing there is putting about 2 cans of PB Blaster on it, and using some professional shop grade back out bits to get it out. I dont really think you can do that here unless you can drill into that bolt and that is like a grade 9 bolt so i'm not sure how far you will get with that. Can you find the "carriage nut"? I'm thinking that if you are able to purchase that seperately, then you can probably replace it without cutting into the sheet metal from the inside? Try talking to the dealer to see what they would do and charge, if nothing else it might give you some ideas....

 

[shoz123]

Yes you will have to cut a hole in the floor.

The Gen 2s had a recall for this. It included a new bolt, nut and a grommet to cover the hole you have to drill. You need a hole saw. But you can still buy the kit from several places.