Ever break a grease zirk ?

[Merkava_4]

Have you ever snapped a grease zerk off when installing it? This one here is a 6mm x 1.0mm grease zirk. It was going in real hard with a nut driver, so I decided to use a 1/4 inch drive ratchet with an 8mm socket to turn it in. Just before it was fully seated, it snapped. I was half way into replacing the lower control arms when I had to abort the mission and go in reverse. Got the old lower control arms back on. I'm pretty angry with myself right now fellas, but I thought I'd risk the embarrassment of posting this in hopes of somebody out there may have the perfect solution.

 

[eljefino]

I feel ya. I know what it's like to bust a fastener just before it's tight enough for my liking.

There's no way to dremel a notch in what's left and get it out with a flat screwdriver? Newness is on your side.

 

[Merkava_4]

It broke flush with the ball joint eljefino. The hole is right around 7/64'' in size which would be the inside diameter of the broken grease fitting. Right now I'm trying to figure out which type of extractor to use.

 

[Trav]

Take a small 1/4" drive hex or torx bit and hammer it into the broken zerk, remove.

 

[GreeCguy]

Trav has a great idea, but if that fails to work, have you thought of using an "easy out"?

 

[expat]

Why was it so tight?
Cross threaded?
Did the old zirk come out OK?

 

[Rob_Roy]

A reverse thread drill bit should spin it right out.

A square nail also works as a cheap & easy extractor for broken grease fittings.