Stripped screw

Can you drill the head off? I will often use a left handed drill to drill out a screw,

and every Blue Moon or so it will grab the screw and pulls it out.

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Posted by: NottaMiata

Vise grips? Sometimes if you can just get it budged a little you can finish with a normal tool. If it does budge, work it back and forth several times to loosen it up a bit before proceeding. You dont want to lose any more material. Vise grips are better than pliers, typically. Pliers will just keep eating up material and create bad, awkward angles that just make a bigger mess. Its situational, of course.

Also, if it was a philips head, you might now have a square hole, and a square bit might work, maybe, possibly.

If this doesn't work, it probably will if you have some beefy vise grips.

Cut a flat head land on the screw head with a broken hacksaw blade, then use a hand held hammer driven impact driver with a clean smack.

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Thank you everyone for all the suggestions. The screw is buried behind the radio so vice grips or hacking a flathead on it isn't possible. I tried left handed drill but still failed. Possibly because again it's buried too deep and the bit isn't long enough (the drill hits the dashboard). I actually started stripping the plastic on the dashboard. After 6 hours, I am giving up. Now I just have to hope I can return the radio.

Sigh. Removing a screw should be a 3 second task and I managed to mess it up. Let's see how I do installing keyless entry lol.

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Pay like $100 to remove a screw lol. I will just live with the broken CD player.

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I appreciate your suggestion and encouragement! I called my mechanic but I think he's off today. Will try other places but likely closed as well. Might move onto keyless entry in the meantime (and mess that up!)

Posted by: NottaMiata

I dont know how it mounts in there, but maybe you could remove the radio instead of the screw, if you catch my drift. Maybe you can get the whole column out or something...

Heh tried that idea and started to strip those screws lol. The angle they sit isn't ideal. Not to mention there's 6 of them. It's probably cakewalk for a pro but I am not risking anymore.

Pics as requested.

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I thought about going from behind too. I can feel it with my finger but not sure any tool can fit back there properly. A needle nose vice/bit/screw thing is probably best bet at this point

The left hand drill kinda does what you describe. You drill a hole first then use the extractor bit to remove it. I think I may have made the hole too big for extractor to grip but mostly because I can't reach it. I could keep drilling until the head falls off but not sure if I risk damaging more stuff. While good suggestions, you forget they don't apply to a level negative 100 =P

Edit: I am totally buying you a beer or ten if we ever meet up.

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