While attempting to remove my front bumper I ran into an unforseen difficulty. Both bumper retaining bolts (the two allen key bolts that secure the bumper to the support brackets) turn a couple of turns, then stick, and wont turn any farther. I'm reluctant to apply any brute force, in fear that I may damage some of the threads.

My question is, should I use some retard strength, by means of a cheater bar or hammer? or is there a better way of extracting these bolts?

 

first time i took mine out, i used crappy allen keys and all that happened was i twisted them allen keys lol. use a cheater bar. you should mess anything up because the bolt is really long so you wouldn't be able to mess anything up. try some PB blaster too

 

....ermm righty tighty lefty loosey....

 

^^ haha i hope he had that part down already. I've never tried to get at the bolts you're talkin about, but stuck bolts in general, i agree with hiwords. PB blaster kicks ***. Spray some of that on there and let it sit a while, then use a cheater bar or somethin. Also, i've found that with allen bolts, using a legit allen SOCKET, rather than the L-shaped keys helps a lot. GL!

 

Haha, i didnt mine with the l-shaped allan key. I put a breaker bar on the end of it though, about a foot or a foot and a half long and they came right out. Wish i did have to socket version though would have made it a hell of a lot easier. Those bolts are long. But You shouldnt break a thing, their a high strength bolt, they hold the bumper on right? PB might not work as well because your spraying straight up and it wont penetrate too far. Just reef on them to get them past that hard spot and you should be fine.

 

You can also use a plumbers or MAPP gas torch.

 

and melt your bumper and the rubber surrounding where the bolts screw into on the bumper shocks. as long as you have the right sized allen socket, just put it on a breaker bar (i guess you guys call that cheatin? never heard of that). if your trying to do it with an allen key your going to be there all day, those bolts are 6 inches long and finely threaded.

 

when i took my bumper off the first time, the passenger bolt wasnt even there, and the driver came out fairly easily... just use the aforementioned socket-bit and at least a 3/8's ratchet.
penetrant probably wont help as the bolts come out towards the ground like NMOCCI said. And if you think of getting a torch in there, you will have a whole new set of problems.

 

My bad, assumed the bumper cover was already off. I really haven't had the front end of my A4 apart yet.

 

Yep, those bolts are LONG - by hand they'll take awhile. They alone are enough to justify air tools (believe me, my impact gun makes quick work of getting those out ). Just do as these guys said, or get penetrating oil like Deep Creep, and let that do some of your work for you.