I've got a caliper bolt that's stripped and won't come off the front passenger side of a 99 Ford Taurus. I've tried vice grips but the head of the bolt is stripped so badly the grips roll right off once I try to turn them. It isn't one of the bigger mounting bolts, it's the lower one of the smaller pin bolts (I guess they're called).
Any advice?
you might have to take the whole bracket thing outand try to drill a hole and use easy out to back the bolt out any repair shop could tell you how to it
The stripped bolt never came out, but I managed to replace the pads anyway. Once I got the top bolt out the caliper swung outward allowing it to be taken off that way. How dangerous is driving around with the stripped bolt? I mean, that suckers in there good.
Does it NEED to come out now that I done what I needed to do anyway?
Something I've noticed during this whole ordeal:
Repair shops are horrible uncooperative with do-it-yourself'ers. Seems they don't want to tell you anything, and just want you to "bring her in" so they can "really see what needs to be done".
As long as you haven't messed up the head of it enough to weaken it you should be ok to just leave it alone.
Repair shops are in business to make money. Paying someone $20 an hour to sit on the phone telling people how to repair their own cars does not accomplish that goal and opens them up to huge liability issues. You can thank our litigous society for their lack of helpfullness.
As to your other questions:
There is no 20 second time on the caliper moving. It will stay in whatever position you put it in until hydraulic pressure makes it move. They make caliper spreaders that make it an easy job to open the caliper back up to replace the pads. About $5 at your friendly auto parts store.
Did you let all the fluid run out of the master cylinder? You have to at least bleed the front brakes before you drive the car again or you won't have any front brakes. If you let all the fluid run out of the master then it needs to be removed and bench bled and there may also be special bleeding procedures for the anti lock system depending on what car you have.
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