Trying to remove my sub frame, and it's not going out with out a fight. Looked simple enough, but I would up rounding off the bolt heads of the bolts that go through the control arm bushings. I got the nuts off, but the bolts won't budge, I tried pounding them through with a hammer, no luck, I tried loosening the 2 bolts that attach the ball joint to the strut tower and started to round off one of those bolts and stopped trying to go down that avenue. Then I tried putting a jack under the control arm to adjust it to different angles, in hopes that it would relieve the pressure on the control arm bolts, no luck. Any one have any ideas or input as to how I can free my sub frame?

 

 

In all these cases you will need to apply copious amounts of PB Blaster
and heat before even trying to use a wrench on anything. Soak the areas
for a couple of days and then use a plumbers torch on each bolt/nut and
try to loosen.

It may take a couple of applications of heat and PB Blaster to get them free.
If you round off the nuts or bolt heads you can try using a vise grip and a
BFH to pound on the vise grip or in some cases you may have to cut the bolts.

The control arm bolts are notorious for rusting onto the steal inserts of the
rubber bushings. Its not unusual to have to cut these off and replace them
on reassembly.

Your working on a 25+ year old car, so don't expect things to just unbolt easily.

 

Ah.... I remember taking that apart on my car. It was a real *****, broke one of the bolts loose from the welds before I finally got it to unscrew and let me drop the crossmember. Yeah, its a damn near 30 year old car, you need to have patience and a lot of PB Blaster, Most if not ALL the bushings I had to burn out and the bolts needed tons of PB blaster to budge.

 

I struggled with those damn A-arm bolts for two days, using torches, sledge hammers, and all kinds of other things. I finally bought an angle grinder with a cut off wheel and had them off in under 15 minutes. The grinder and wheel were under 20 bucks at Harbor Freight. It's usually easier to replace the bolts with new ones, than it is to get your wasted time back.


.

 

Buy new bolts, cut off old ones. I had to do that with most of my suspension because the steel sleeves like to become one with the bolt as mentioned, and it's just a much smaller headache to chop them off and buy new ones.

 

I have one of those cheap air chisels. Use the pointed insert and hammer away. If that fails, then a sawzall or die grinder with a 1/8" metal cutting disc.