Stripped Car Battery connection

[news.eternal-september.org]

Car battery with stripped threads in female connection for bolt entry.

It's nearly new and cost a small fortune; is there any way to save this battery?

Checked at Lowes, Canadian Tire and NAPA; the only advice anyone had was to put a larger bolt on and "force" it to thread into the lead. That doesn't sound very reasonable to me.

For the time being I've slipped some solder around the threads to take up space and it let the bolt tighten into the battery firmly, but since solder has no "memory" (will squash and not apply any pressure eventually) I don't think it's a very reliable "fix".

Any better suggestions?

[hallerb]

did you try running a tap thru whats left of the threads?

[AZ Nomad]

Is that car also your home?

take it to rec.autos.tech

[willshak]

news.eternal-september.org wrote the following:

Use a thread insert and a smaller bolt.

[Andy]

Andy comments

Have you considered a helicoil insert, of the type that is used for stripped spark plug threads ? I don't know if this is a good idea or not, since I have never used one for this purpose, but it may be reasonable....

[Nate Nagel]

Heli-Coil? Not sure if that's a really good idea or not, but it was the best I could come up with on short notice.

You could try to melt some lead into the hole and retap, but that sounds... um... a little dangerous.

nate

[Red Green]

willshak wrote in news:55ydnb0- eObhBc7WnZ2dnUVZ [e-mail]:

Is it lead? An off the cuff hairbrain idea. Fishing sinkers still made of lead. Get some tiny ones, pound them in, drill and retap.

[aemeijers]

Any old time roofing supply or gutter installers near you? Some skinny strips of lead sheet, beaten thin, hung in the hole before you insert the bolt, may work. Like putting a toothpick in a wallowed-out screw hole in wood. Probably want a bolt with a taper on the end. The strips and the hole need to be shiny when you do this, of course.

-- aem sends...

[Lp1331 1p1331]

I had the exact same thing happen to me a few years ago. As I recall, I cut the head off of a bolt and forced it into the hole, and poured melted lead into the hole so it ran into any gaps-- I think from fishing sinkers, as was mentioned, I put the cable on with nut that I tightened finger tight,then held the end of the bolt with vise grips while I tightened the nut the rest of the way.It seemed to work ok. That is the reason I like batteries that have both side and top posts for GM vehicles-- if something like this happens to the side terminal, you can adapt to the top one, assuming you have room on top. Larry

[Caesar Romano]

On Sun, 17 Jan 2010 17:45:33 -0500, "news.eternal-september.org" wrote Re Stripped Car Battery connection:

Maybe something like this?

[Hustlin' Hank]

Use a lag bolt.

Hank

[HeyBub]

1. Wide, but short, lag bolt? Once secured, slather it with anti-corrosion material (or axle grease).
2. Got any battery salvage or rebuilding shops in your town? They might have something off the shelf.

[hallerb]

Lead is soft remove battery, use small screwdriver and perhaps hammer if needed to rough up inside of threads a bit, then retap carefully..

[Van Chocstraw]

Melt some lead into the hole and fill it. Re-drill and tap.

[terry]

Good idea Hank: But not too deep a lag bolt cos it might break into the interior of the battery. Or get a suitable diameter size lag bolt but grind off the pointy end so as to make it less deep. Another idea is to wrap some wire, copper or stainless steel, around the bolt and see if that will secure it. Also a similar but very slightly larger bolt might be used to cut new and slightly deeper threads into the lead insert. e.g try a non metric in a metric thread, or vice versa. Inspect the nuts and bolts junk box. Number of other ideas would include filling in the old threaded hole with melted lead (from old balance weights one is always picking up around tyre changing locations! Don't you? We do; might always come in handy for something!!!!!) Then carefully drilling and tap threading anew.

[Jim Yanik]

aemeijers wrote in news:xYydnSAPA7VTSs7WnZ2dnUVZ [e-mail]:

he could always use a tap and cut new threads for a larger bolt.