Finn recently broke a tension bolt after failing to remove them one at

a time and coating

them with RTV and replacing them as suggested on here after Perry Mick

broke a bolt.

He was able to get the broken stub out by welding
a drill bit to a long rod and using a centering collar to drill the

broken stub. He then used

a Easy Out welded to a rod and removed the broken stub. Unfortunately

the water seal

O-ring melted (he was not using teflon encapsulated water seal

O-rings) and still leaked

coolant. Never the less he flew the airplane about 50 miles back and

fourth to

Sun & Fun for several days by adding a gallon or so of antifreeze

before each takeoff.

Paul Lamar

A few corrections:
I used common 12" #40 and #30 drill bits.
As usual Paul is exaggerating: less than a pint of coolant after .6

hours.

Last weekend it was even lower, maybe only 4 - 8 oz of coolant. I ran

the engine hotter (up to 212 F water and oil) after taping shut my left cowl
cheek (in preparation

to adding the cowl cheek extensions). Maybe the engine will pull itself

back together (heal itself) if I run it hot enough ?!

Finn

I stand corrected Finn. Sorry. I was quoting from memory a comment Tracy

made on the

situation. I should have interviewed you on the subject at Sun & Fun. I

was too

busy this year being responsible for Dave Grabber's DG1.

"(heal itself)"? I would not count on it.

Paul Lamar

Tom Kendall wrote:

 
Gee, I dunno Paul.  I recall a once-very-secret incident when a certain
pioneering submarine (the Nautilus) developed a leak in their main
condenser.  Stopping in at San Francisco for a "liberty port", all the
swabbies were sent ashore with orders to fan out and buy all they radiator
stop leak they could lay hands on, but not to do it all in one place or to
raise suspicions.

Returning to the sub, they ran literally hundreds of gallons of the stuff
through the main seawater condenser (1 quart at a time), weighed anchor, and
proceeded to make the first submerged transit of the North Pole running
under the ice.  Pretty ballsy I'd say.  Can't glide to a force landing.

So Finn, have you tried Barr's Stop-Leak?  Wreaks havoc on old heater cores
by fouling the surfaces, but if you've got a relatively clean rad, it might
just work wonders.  Another mechanic's trick is to use a *small* amount of
ground black pepper.  It will find the leak and coagulate in it as it
absorbs coolant.  Warning:  I tried this with a leaking truck radiator and
put too much in.  Plugged the whole darned thing solid and boiled over in
~20 miles.

What a coincidence. We did that with Perry's broken tension bolt leak and 
we think it plugged the radiators.

Paul Lamar
 
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