Getting this old track bar out of the XJ

[bradleyheathhays]

I developed a bit of death wobble in the old 96er recently and traced it to the driver side connection of my track bar, so I'm in the middle of getting it out. I've been soaking the passenger side connection in the picture below with PB for a while now, and it's still distressingly hard to turn. I can get the red bolt head to turn some using 4-5" worth of cheater bar on my 3/8" ratchet, but only until the yellow nut tab reaches it's limit of travel within the rectangular hole it protrudes through. I keep doing PB soaks, torches followed by cold water dousing cycles, but it's not getting any easier to turn at all. The nut is rotating with the bolt because the tab moves when I turn the bolt, so the nut is not what's holding it up. My best idea is that the bolt has rusted to the metal sleeve in the track bar bushing and that sleeve is rotating with the bolt, held by the friction against the rubber. I haven't even tried to rotate the bolt past where the nut tab comes in contact with it's limits as I'm almost putting enough torque on it to twist the head off already.

Any advice on working this thing?

Also, say the bolt head were to snap off. What would you do to get the bolt out? My only idea would be to try to push the bolt through from the head side with an awl or something smaller than the bolt diameter, then try to get an oscillating cutter up into that window on the right and piece by piece cut the end of the bolt off until it all comes through. Thoughts?

 

[bradleyheathhays]

The nut tab circled in yellow bent when I tried to loosen the bolt so now I'm gonna have to sawzall down the sides of the bar to cut the bolt. I'll be cutting where the two red lines are below. Since I'll be cutting through hardened steel is there any kind of special blade I should look for, or just buy a lot of metal cutting blades and just keep changing them out until it's done?



Also, I'm seeing that the lube bulb (I'll call it) on the new track bar is different from what I've seen in the past. Is this how they are now? I'm assuming when the bar is installed, the bulb comes together like in the second pic and keeps the grease in? Does this bar look normal, or am I seeing something that's come apart here?

 

[bradleyheathhays]

I haven't seen any of these newer design grease retention cups yet, and I want to make sure I didn't receive a defective replacement track bar. Is the rubber cup I'm seeing separated in the first pic supposed to 'seal' up and sit closer to the bar after installation, like in the second picture? The cup lip is sitting outside of the track bar lip here.



The cup lip is sitting outside of the track bar lip here...

 

[bradleyheathhays]

Well, this stubborn bolt has made for one heck of a success story. After numerous heating and cooling cycles, with PB applied in between, the nut finally loosened from a very hard lock. To pay back for the help, I'll give some golden advice here that I've rarely ever seen mentioned. Dousing a bolt/joint with cold water right after heating with a torch is even MORE effective at breaking up rust crystals than the initial heating. The reason is that you're trying to achieve incongruous movement between the two metal surfaces through whatever method you can. Heat makes things expand, thus disrupting the crystals, but cold water applied makes the metal change size (shrink) much more asymmetrically (key word) and quickly than the original fire, and does just as much good breaking the crystals as the heating. I've been using this method for a very long time now and can't recall anyone giving this water dousing advice for at least the last decade of being on a good many internet auto forums.

Quick question. Can anyone suggest a good solvent/whatever to get the last remnants of this decal adhesive before I put the new one over this spot? I've let some Goo Gone original sit on it a couple times and it's not really touching it.