You have to give the shop some credit when they admit a job is beyond
them. As for the nut cracker, they won't fit unless you cut the pipe
flush with the flange. From the factory, only 2 head connections are
done with studs and nuts, the other 2 are done with bolts. Now someone
with skill and experience can get the remains of the nuts off with a
torch and some luck. If the bolts or studs do break, a small right angle
drill can get them drilled out without removing the heads. If needed,
heli-coils can restore the threads to better than new.

Dennis

-----Original Message-----
From: Vanagon Mailing List [mailto:vanagon@gerry.vanagon.com] On Behalf
Of John Rodgers
Sent: Wednesday, January 14, 2004 1:26 PM
To: vanagon@GERRY.VANAGON.COM
Subject: Re: Exaust

Thats BOGUS!!! ?Even in a worst case scenario a nut cracker can be used
to remove a nut without backing out a stud. You should always use new
nuts anyway. A lot of shops want to flat-rate you by "the book" That way
they can charge a book price, yet they can do the job in half the time.
So you get to pay full job labor price for 1/2 the labor effort
expended. If they can't do it that way, they simply don't want to
bother. There are variety of nut cracker/nut removal tools out there.
Any real shop will have one and know how to use it effectively and
efficiently. I would definitely look elsewhere.

My $0.02.

John Rodgers
88 GL Driver

C. Chris Snyder wrote:

>---I need to have the exaust system (pipes) replaced on my '87 Vanagon
however, I can not find ANY exaust shop where I live that will take on
the job. They state that Volkswagon uses steel bolts in an alinuim head
and that the bolts always break and then the heads have to be taken off
and the bolt drilled out etc.
>
>