Grease nipples to lube the back of the rear spring, BT7

[dvu101]

Both grease nipples on both sides of my back of the rear springs have broken off. the inside of the of the the caviety is full of dried out grease.

Any suggestions on fixing the problem?

Thanks in advance...

Scott.

 

[Richard Dickinson]

Maybe hard to get to but a screw extractor should work. Just be careful not to break it off because they are such hard steel you can't drill them out.

 

[vette]

Say 101, I had alot of fun replacing my bushings awhile back so hearing you have hard, dried grease brings back memories. I think the screw extractor might get the remnants of the fittings out but then you will want to to something about the dried grease. You might be able to save the whole works by spraying alot of WD-40 in there. Put a walker jack under the axle bolts and lift the axle up and down while your at it to get some movement in the joint. I had to take mine apart a few times till I got the bushing reamed out to a reasonable size. So I had my spring unbolted from the axle. If you try to remove the rear spring shackles with the spring bolted to the axle I think you will have A WHOLE LOT of tension on there and it might not be good. But you could possibly wedge the leaf spring against the trunk box floor with some wood shoreing so that it doesn't go up on you when you try to get the bolt out. I'll try to find a pic i made of the bolt and shackle arrangement.

View attachment 26503

 

[57_BN4]

A simple solution is to get a needle point grease gun fitting and grease them through the broken off fittings.

If you want to get them out, the square tapered part of a file where the handle goes on is useful for extracting broken off grease nipples. Find a suitable size one and gently tap it into the broken off bit then try to unwind it. If it won't come out easily then a stud extractor for that size hole will probably break off. You can drill them inwards too but you'll have to disassemble everything first.

Andy.

 

[dvu101]

If i heat the bushing will that get the dried grease out?

Then i can work on the broken grease nipple i guess.

 

[vette]

Heat always helps loosen anything. But unless you have ideal conditions you can be in for a hazzardous/dangerous situation. If you are working with the car on jack stands and you are laying on the floor. realize that with grease and paint around in close quarters and with limited movement on your part, a fire is a real possibility. If you do want to heat it, have a helper there with a water bottle and or fire extinguisher. Also even tho you heat it, you have very limited ability to move the joint which most likely would be necessary to get things loosened up. It is not that hard to take the spring loose from the axle. Then you can separate the spring shackle with out any tension on it.
I had the same situation with my shackles (hard grease, and wouldnot take new grease). While restoring the body, I looked closely at the shackles, bolts and bushings. The bolts and bushings were worn considerably and no amount of grease was going to take up that much play. So it was time to change bushings and bolts. I might suspect that your parts are worn as well. Maybe time to bite the bullet and take it apart. I believe I did a thread withing the last year about what I had to do to change the bushings. Dave.

 

[Johnny]

I soaked mine with PB blaster and let sit overnight. Then using smaller drills was able to drill just the right size to remove most of the threads from the grease fitting. Then a screw extractor eazed the remaining pieces out.

 

[dvu101]

Thanks guys, I will try your suggestions.