Help, stripped flats off Center Bolt

Sears makes a special tool that will "bite" down on stripped bolt heads. They sell them as a set for around $40. I have a set and have used it more than once. Well worth the money and they really work.

Mark

I'm not sure im visualizing your problem correctly. An idea that might work is to drill out the head with a drill bit. When the head falls off, then perhaps you can dissasemble whats being held together.
Good luck

If I understand correctly, you rounded off the head of a bolt that's hard to get to. If you can't get a pair of vice grips in there you'll have to kill the bolt head or try that special tool that I have never used.

If you decide to kill the bolt head, you have several options. The easiest, but probably not usable in your situation, cure would be to weld something to the top of the bolt (like another bolt) that you could then use a socket wrench on. Your best option would probably be to drill a hole in the top of the bolt, then use an extractor. The basic idea is that you drill down into the bolt, then take the extractor (just a square rod of hardened steel that's tapered near one end) and pound it into the hole you drilled. You then use a wrench to turn the extractor, which turns the bolt and takes it out. If all else fails, drill through the bolt completely, then run a tap through the hole to rethread it for a larger bolt.

An easyout would probably work. Sears or most hardware stores have them.
To use you first drill a hole into the stripped bolt then the easyout goes into the hole and as it turns itself into the center of the stripped bolt it starts biting in and eventually locks. Then as you continue turning it it should back the bolt out.
Take your time and good luck

regardless of how you get it out it needs to be replaced and should not have been so tight that you had to mangle it in the first place the tops of forks should get about 6 to 9 foot pounds of torque. and when they go back in the triple clamps the top clamp bolts get 16 foot pounds and bottom clamp 15 foot pounds

Any stuck bolt I have I use a good penetrating oil + time(leave to soak overnight) + a little heat (not too hot on forks, dont want to damage any internals) Usually works.
To avoid rounding in the first place, ensure all is clean so you can get the socket fully on the nut, and use a good quality correct size socket.