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Removing Cross-Threaded Screws from Hardware?
TeaDaemon asks: "I currently have an expensive (dual CPU) motherboard mounted in a rack case. One of the mounting screws is cross-threaded, preventing me from removing the board. The case is designed to prevent access to the back of the risers, so that's not an option. Does anyone have experience with this sort of problem? Can anyone suggest a reliable way of removing said screw without damaging the board or any of it's components? The screw is next to the PCI slots, and has a couple of capacitors and ICs near by. Any help would be greatly appreciated."
use a 2mm or 3mm LH drillbit. drill it out, and when you remove the board, just replace the standoff.
Thank god I ponied up my hard-mooched cash for that Slashdot subscription, so I could see this story nice and early!
Unfortunately, I've been sitting here with my jaw slack in stunned silence ever since it appeared. I keep staring at the screen, and it stubbornly persists in saying "Ask Slashdot," when I know, KNOW, that it really says "The Home Depot."
"Dear Slashdot, I cross-threaded a screw. What should I do?"
"Dear Slashdot, my toilet is backed up. What should I do?"
"Dear Slashdot, my grass is too tall. What should I do?"
"Dear Slashdot, my cat wants something, and I don't know what. What should I do?"
It's the end times, people. Repent and be saved while you still can, 'cause shit like this MUST be one of the signs of the pockyclipse.
If you can use a very small drill bit and clean out the hole just like a root canal.
Be very slow, very careful and try every so often to see if you can yank out the screw w/o killing the board.
Slow yes, but it'd work.
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ping -f 255.255.255.255 # if only
The obvious answer is to drill it out. Since you'll want to be a little careful, you should probably start with an extremely small bit and drill a pinhole into it first, and then work up the bit sizes one by one until the head pretty much falls off the screw. It will destroy both the screw and the mount, but they were crossthreaded anyways.
The obvious issue is of course metal shavings. A small amount of cutting fluid on the bits (or probably any liquid, maybe wd-40) will help to a small degree to keep the shavings from flying around as much (they'll tend to travel up the grooves in the bit instead). More importantly - mask things off. Cut a small 3/4" or so square hole in the center of a large peice of paper. Cover the hole in masking tape. Place the taped hole over the screw, taping the hole down all around it - then cut the circle of tape off the head of the screw where you'll be drilling. You should be able to keep the shavings on the peice of paper instead of on the motherboard shorting out little pins and things.
11*43+456^2
One word: Vise-Grip. If you can get a purchase on the head, you're home free.
If brute force don't work, you ain't using enough of it.
The only option I can think of is take a drill press and with the rack secured underneith (this is assuming you can remove that) carefully drill teh screw out. I'd suggest that you start with a real small bit and work your way up... Be carfull not too go to big. Once you have a bin enough hold insert a tap and unscrew it that way. You'll want to make sure nothing moves (you don't want to damage the board) and go slow.
Patrick Havens (Mr. 573333 to you.) Graphic Artist / Coder / Father / Journeler
This question posed in "Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance". You have what the author would call "stuckness."
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$tar -xvf
First off, everyone should have one of these. The dazzling array of bits should help you brainstorm halfway out of any problem.
More likely you need a drill with a bit extractor kit.
Not really sure what specifics you're dealing with, but just go into a real hardware store (not a harware shopping mall like home depot) and ask the guy (or girl!) with the most nicks and scars on his hands. They could probably do it with a swiss army knife.
~a
Tools needed: 1 Dremel Moto-Tool (or equivalent) and an appropriate burr bit; 1 vacuum cleaner with smallish wand; 1 clear "safety cap" from a bottled water bottle; clear adhesive tape as needed.
Here's the idea: using the moto-tool, drill a hole in the TOP of the safety cap just big enough for the bit to pass thru. Also drill a hole in the side of the cap you can attach the vacuum cleaner wand to with the adhesive tape.
Now here's how to use it: turn the vacuum cleaner on and place your fashioned hood over the screw. The suction may keep it in place, or you may need a helper or duct tape. Now stick your moto-tool in the top of the hood and grind away. Hopefully, the vacuum cleaner will suck away the filings well enough to prevent damage to the motherboard.
Here's another thought: if you can access the edge of the motherboard, you might be able to get a hacksaw blade between the mobo and the case and cut the offending standoff off.
Give me my freedom, and I'll take care of my own security, thank you.
The one thing I've seen missing from these posts is the use of a screw extractor. Once you have a small hole drilled into the screw, replace the bit with a screw extractor. This is a wedge shaped bit the that has flanges designed to dig in to the hole as the bit is on reverse. You might have trouble finding one small enough for a motherboard. But it may save the housing , and you will have only lost the screw.
Open Source Identity Management: FreeIPA.org
Once you've drilled the first small hole you can use a small screw extractor (basically a reverse threaded screw) to get it out. The idea is that you screw the extractor into the hole you've drilled in the stuck screw you need to get out, and once it "bites" you should be able to thread it out.
:)
x tractor/
I use them all the time when working on my car. It'll take alot less time and have the added benefit of producing alot less shavings.
Plus it's an excuse to buy more tools!
Here is a page that describes the use of a screw extractor if you aren't familiar with them:
http://www.bluepoof.com/motorcycles/howto/screw_e
A drop of water on the head of the screw.
Wait for it to rust.
One tube of KY Jelly
One large drill press
One buffalo - live or stuffed, preferably stuffed, for safety's sake
One seven layer burrito
Two female midgets, preferably with experience in adult films
One hand drill or dremmel moto-tool
One 1-2 mm drill bit
3.25 pounds of hashish
One set of rubber sheets
What to do:
Use the hand drill or dremmel coupled with the small bit to drill the center of the screw away. Next, gather the sex jelly, drill press, buffalo, seven layer burrito, midgets, hash, and sheets and have fun celebrating your newly freed motherboard.
How are you going to keep them down on the farm once they've seen Karl Hungus?
It's not one of those screws that you can use a 1/4" socket on the outside of is it?
Put a magnet on the motherboard! W00t!
You can cut a potato in half and ram on end of the potato to the end of the socket where the light broke off.
Make sure you have turned off the light switch to prevent an electric shock
If that does not work, use your teeth; regardless of what your mother used to say about putting legos in your mouth.
Still, if that does not work, run around the house with a pair of very sharp scissors.
I'm surprised nobody else has suggested this:
Find the idiot who cross-threaded the screw to begin with, and explain to them that their life depends on their ability to remove that screw without damaging the motherboard.
Then leave them alone while they solve the problem for you. This is a forward-looking solution, as it not only fixes the current problem but also reduces the likelihood of future problems.
I smoked all the hashish and now I dont remember what I wanted to do!
What the poster may mean is that the screw head itself is stripped out. Most of the suggestions above seem to relate to drilling out a stripped screw head.
I said "usually", above. Sometimes, if it's cross-threaded, then when you try to unscrew it, you end up turning the screw and the standoff, and unscrewing the standoff from the screw on the other end. If the other-end screw is (or gets) loose, all three turn freely, and you get nowhere. Even drilling might not help, because the bit just spins the whole assembly.
If this is what really happened, the only solution is to get a grip on either the standoff or the screwhead. If you manage the former, you can just unscrew it. If only the latter (e.g. with a vise-grip) then you can drill it out. You might want to super-glue the other end of standoff into place afterward, if you can't tighten that side's screw.
In general, you should post a more precise description of your problem if you hope to get helpful answers.
Can I use green or mex instead of hash? How about resin? Can I replace the buffalo with a stuffed cow? I'm on a budget and can't get to Lebanon easily. Got the midgets though! Thanks Soft Cell.
Drilling the screw out is a waste of time and effort. Get a small pair of locking pliers (Vise-grips are a common brand, I don't know how small they come though) grip the head of the screw, and turn. I have a small pair and I can't count how often they've come in handy in situations like this. Also, once you get the screw out, you can fix the offending standoff with a rethreading tap.
-Splat
Gripping the standoff from below with a hemostat is useful as well
Umm, you do realise that magnets generally don't damage computer electronics apart from magnetic storage and CRTs, right? I'm sure you could find an odd case of something else they destroy (Floppy read heads?) but AFAIK, none of that will be soldered onto the motherboard.
If you could be told what you can see or read, then it follows that you could be told what to say or think - BoC
You are doing surgery, approach it as such. Get some thin nylon cloth and use a hole punch or something similar to make a small hole large enough to fit the screw head.
Put the cloth on the motherboard, with the hole centered on the screw. Press it down so that the cloth is below the level of the screw. Drill away, using increasingly larger bits. When removing the cloth, put your finger on the hole. With the other hand, pick up the edges of the cloth, using your finger to seal the hole.
Good Luck
Sig (appended to the end of comments you post, 120 chars)
The worst case is a new case.
If none of the above tricks work to get the screw out, use the Dremel tool to drill or cut the stand-off/mount away from the case. Chances are then that you'll want to get a new case but WTF, they're cheaper than the board.
Once you have the board free you'll have more room to work on getting the remaining mount and offending screw to part ways.
. Quit playing Monopoly with Bill. Switch to one of many non-Microsoft products today.
This is a Slashdot discussion, too narrow a definition & the discussion is stiffiled. One right answer [repeated 3 times] & the plethora of obligatory funnies = Editor not picking too well. Move right along now, nothing to see here.
No. You can't look at my Sig; it's mine, and I'm not showing you.
File or saw a slot on the head of the fastener and then use a screwdriver to remove.
vise-grips, screwdriver(flathead), hammer. Pretty much anything is fixable given these three.
If it doesn't fit, force it. If it breaks, it needed replacing anyway.
hi!
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a photo of "spoken-of" casing would help.
what's a "cross-threaded" screw?
i think the solution is revers-engineering. there's nothing you couldn't do backwards in time
i mean they probably mounted the racket to the casing, so unmount the WHOLE racket from the casing,
then you should have access to the screw, that is holding the motherboard to the racket.
anyways.
really: think back-wards, how did they cross-threade it (i mean in the factory) how did they build it like that? now the whole thing backwards. part A on part B on part C. so backwards: part C of part B of part A
reverse assembly is ALWAYS easy if they don't weld or glue stuff together.
anyways, if you can't reverse-engineere it, then they are protecting their investment and i wouldn't buy products from that comapny again.
would you care to tell who's the manufacturer?
We decided to try the superglue method, which seemed to have something going for it. However, when that failed we resorted to using a lever through the pci slot in the case (with a fulcrum outside the case), and a screwdriver with superglue. Thanks to anyoone that posted ideas, we're very grateful.