A customer at the shop in Boulder brought in a bike with a stripped seatpost bolt, and it changed how I think about aluminum frames.

It was a carbon frame with an alloy post, and the bolt was totally rounded out. My boss wanted to drill it out, but I remembered a trick from an old mechanic about using a Torx bit you hammer in. We tried it, and it worked in about five minutes. Now I'm split: is it better to always go straight for the drill, or try the 'gentler' hammer trick first on stuck alloy parts? What's your shop's standard move for this?

3 comments

3 Comments

craig.tessa1mo ago

Hammer in the Torx bit first, every single time.

the_phoenix1mo ago

Wait, your boss just wanted to DRILL it out first? That's a wild first move.

fiona_lane7d ago

Oh yeah, because nothing says "precision repair" like going straight for the drill and hoping for the best, right @the_phoenix? I swear some shop bosses just want an excuse to make a bigger mess before the easy fix comes along. Torx hammer trick all day, it's like the bike gods invented that method to save us from ourselves.