I have a bike which uses the tubular steel frame as a water pipe. There is a small air bleed screw that has sheared off when I tried to un do it.
I foolishly then tried to drill it out and use one of those left hand thread screw in stud extractor, the extractor broke and the point is in the hole.
There is less than two inches of clearance between the hole and the engine, meaning there is little access to drill straight, so even if I had carbide drills to cope with the extractor fragment, it is never going to be a clean hole that I could retap.
My plan now is to pack the hole with plastic steel (JB Weld Steelstick), and hope that sets to a permanent plug that will withstand a pressurised coolant. I can bleed air by laying the bike over, so not worried about that.
Has anyone used one of these puttys on a pressurised system? Did it hold up?
A proper bodge would be a piece of stiff rubber held in place with a jubilee clip if the contours of the repair area allow. Shouldn’t be too much pressure involved if it’s cooling system. Alternative would be jb weld with a metal patch over it. I’ve found in the past that the epoxy alone is not sufficient
A similar bodge would be a rubber patch under a shaped metal plate held in place by 2 or 3 zip ties pulled good and tight, perhaps with silicone sealant under the rubber to ensure a seal.
On my ZL650 Kwacker, I drilled out a broken stud for the amber side reflectors, mounted directly onto to sides of the radiator. You can guess what happened! Drilled straight into the radiator! Anyway JB weld sorted it and never had any issue after the repair! Good stuff
Barrie
Just be aware of the long working time, it needs to be carefully clamped in place overnight for strength.
My first use was on the cast-ali blade guard for a DeWalt 10" circular saw; the main mounting bracket was part of the casting and it had a void-bubble inside which turned out to be a weak spot. Twenty years later it is still in one piece thanks to that tiny bit of JBWeld.
Another use was to help a helicoil hold a replacement exhaust manifold stud on my old Vextra - it kept the car MOT-worthy for another couple of years.
Most recent use was to repair an Armillary damaged in transit.
The problem with jb weld on this is that I am looking to fill a hole, which is open both ends, one end inside the down tube. JB Weld looks runny and I have no way to contain it in the void. Hence why I am looking at steelstik putty.
So my plan is to fill the void with putty, let that set, then glue a plate over the end with JB Weld.
It’s not exactly runny, but creeps very well! In my experience if the gap is thinner than a millimetre or so, then it will remain where you put it, but if three or four millimetres then containment is definitely required.
However some ordinary gaffertape would contain it if you could allow the outside of the hole to be at a lowest point, and any surplus inside would puddle across nicely.
But, would this mean putting the bike upside down? Awkward, if so.
