Broke a Stud in Car Exhaust Manifold How to Remove it by Drilling

Oh, looks like we got a broken manifold stud. We're going to have to drill this out.

Hey, friends, it's Len here from 1A Auto. So, today, we're working on a Ford 5.4-liter three-valve engine. I'm trying to remove the passenger side manifold over here and what happens every single time, I broke a stud. Now, one of the first things I want to talk about before we get into actually doing any work is just the fact that you're going to be having to do some drilling. With the broken stud that's going to be located inside of your engine, we're going to have to try to drill it out with a nice, small drill bit right down the center. You essentially want to start a pilot hole. The reason why you need it to be inside the center of the stud is because if you go out towards one of the edges, you could potentially drill into the engine. Essentially, if you were to drill into the engine even a little bit, if it's a little bit too far, you could go into the cooling jacket. At that point, well, you bought yourself a head for your engine, and that's a really big job. Aside from that, we're definitely gonna wanna make sure that we drill this out as straight as possible with the original hole that's going to be inside of there. For me personally, I have access to a nice adapter tool, and this is going to help make sure that I have everything nice and straight. This is what I'm going to use to do it, and I have a three-valve engine, like I said.

You need to, of course, first sand down the entire mating surface, where your manifold is going to hit up against your engine, or at least the gasket is. Once you have it so the whole entire area is nice and smooth, we're going to continue on to putting in a couple of these manifolds studs in the good existing holes. Now that we have the studs in, let's continue on by putting the plate up. You're going to notice that you have the three valve holes or the two valve holes depending on which engine you're using. And then, of course, once you have those two studs lined up, this is going to be where the pilot hole is for our drill. You want to make sure that's also inside the three valve hole on the opposite side. Put on the nuts and hold it to the engine. So, now that this is nice and secured to the engine, we're going to go ahead and get our drill bit ready. It's a good idea to make sure you coat your drill bit with a little bit of ultra-thin oil. That's going to help lubricate it and keep it sharp for a long time. And then this is of course going to guide the drill bit in a specific direction the way that it needs to go. Of course, if you didn't use this, if you went like this a little bit, like this a little bit, or even in any direction other than the direction of the actual stud, like I said, you could cause potential damage to your engine.

Okay. So, our particular hole isn't actually right here out in the open. It's pretty much right here. It's the forward one behind the shock tower. So, I'm going to go ahead and move that bracket over so I can get to work. Okay. So, now with our adapter up there, we're just gonna go ahead and slide our drill bit right into it. This is going to start the pilot hole. After this, we'll remove the adapter and then start drilling a larger hole. Now, what we're going to do is go ahead and take off that adapter. And we want to just make sure that we're in the center of the existing stud that's in there. I like to just go ahead and blow it out with a little bit of compressed air, maybe a little bit of parts cleaner. And then, of course, we're going to check the depth after we make sure that we're completely centered. Before you go ahead and drill in there too much, what you to do is you want to take something that you can stick inside of the hole. You can use a paperclip or whatever you got. Essentially, I'm just going to put it inside one of my known good holes, and I'm going to measure the length of that hole. After that, I just put a little piece of tape and then I'm going to go ahead and go to the one that I'm drilling, and essentially just kind of gauge myself. I don't want to go any deeper than any of the original holes.

I'll just just use our tool and we're going to check to see just how far we went in comparison to our good holes. As you can tell, we still have quite a ways to go, but that's good because we definitely don't want to drill further than what we've got. And essentially, we're only going to go approximately 1/2 to 3/4 of the depth, and then after that, we'll step it up to the next drill bit size. And then after that, we'll continue on with an easy out. Also, to check your depth, if you were to take a brand new stud, you're going to find that you have an area that does not have the threads. That's going to be the area that bottoms out against the engine. If you wanted to, you can just go ahead and mark your drill bit so you know the approximate depth that you need to go. That way there you don't go too far into the engine. So, let's just take a look at this hole with the borescope. As you can tell, we're starting to get a nice pilot hole and it's pretty close to the center. Now that we have our pilot hole drilled out with our smaller drill bit, it's time to step it up. When you step it up, of course, you want to measure from the very tip down to approximately an inch. And then I, of course, tape it off. That's going to make it so I don't drill too deep. Once again, we're going to continue on by using a tiny bit of motor oil.

It's a good idea to keep checking it to make sure that you're going in the direction that you need to. Now that we have that drilled, let's go ahead and clean it. Let's check our depth here. Oh yeah, that feels good. So, at this point, let's continue on with an extractor. All right. So, I've got my extractor started in there. I'm just going to give it a couple of taps with a hammer just to get it so it's sitting well. At this point, let's continue on by trying to remove this. The extractors are counterclockwise driven. So, essentially, as we turn this counterclockwise, it's hopefully gonna grab onto that existing stud that's broken in there and pull it out. As you can tell, the threads are starting to come out. This is a great sign. This means we're coming right out. There it is, friends. All right. So, this is what it looks like after we get it all done. This looks great.

Okay, friends, so this was a real nightmare, not just because I had to drill out a manifold stud that was broken inside of an engine, but also because it was one of the studs that, well, I really couldn't see. As you can tell, it's kind of a pain in the butt, but it is doable. You just have to have a little bit of patience and, of course, the proper tools. Just remember as you're drilling this, you want to make sure that you're going flush with the engine. If the engine is a little bit at an angle along the side, you need to be going at an angle like this when you're drilling. Don't go like that. As you could tell by looking at my stud, it looks like I drilled pretty well. And as soon as I got through the stud, I felt it kind of through and I stopped right away. At that point, I stepped up the drill bit. I went in about halfway and I used my easy out. The easy out, well, it did its job, It made it easily come out at that point. With that said, I hope you learned a little something in the video. If you did and you want to talk about it or maybe you got something to say of your own, go ahead and leave it in the comment section below because I always love to hear from you. If you like the video, smash on the like button for me, it would mean the world. While you're at it, go ahead and subscribe and ring the bell. That way there you can be kept up with all of our latest content. Thanks.