Being the ham handed amateur gun plumber I am, I managed to break off a Brownells hex driver tip flush with the top of the castle nut set screw on the flash hider of my M1A match rifle. The broken tip is flush with the top of the set screw which of course is recessed into the flash hider and offers no surface for a dental pick or other type of prying device that would help me pull it out...its in there tight for sure. Any ideas?

Either drill it out and use a screw extractor or if there is enough sticking out see if you can use some five minute epoxy to stick a piece of drill rod or an allen wrench to it and turn it out. Will probably mess up the screw, but just get a replacement.

Problem is the hex tool is very hard tool steel. I could care less about the screw...its a .50 cent part and I have a half dozen. Might try some fast setting epoxy though.

Superglue a slightly smaller Allen wrench to the broken piece, turn slightly backwards to the direction you were going when it broke, and lift out the broken chunk.

Get a left handed drill bit and carefully try to drill it out with a reversing drill, hopefully it will grab and wind out.

Also, you can try a dental burr to grind enough away so you can grab it with a fish hook barb.

Find someone with a TIG welder and get them to stick the tungsten to the broken piece. Works every time.

Mark and Rick:
It's the allen WRENCH that's broken off, not the screw.

KY Nimrod, just be glad that it's not the ball off a ball end allen wrench, those are realy a pain.

Let's take the practical approach first.

if the flash hider secured well enough?

I would go shot 20-30 rounds and see if that vibration doesn't get rid of the problem for you!!!

I mean, sure, it's not a repeatable removale process, but it will probably work.

what is it, a T10 or T15?

if not, put a couple drop of brake fluid on it, and follow mark's advice.

jeffe

quote:

Originally posted by Tailgunner:
Mark and Rick:
It's the allen WRENCH that's broken off, not the screw.

KY Nimrod, just be glad that it's not the ball off a ball end allen wrench, those are realy a pain.

I understood that. That’s why I mentioned the epoxy to attach something to the portion that is broken off so you could screw the whole thing out and replace the screw.

My M1A takes a Brownells 221X allen bit on that set screw (not a torx like our moderator said) and if you epoxy, glue, whatever, a piece of drill rod or even the shank portion of the bit you broke off to the screw it should come out.

If you have castle-nut pliers you might also see if you can turn the nut just a bit and take some of the tension off the screw.

A couple of other possibilities which are not likely, but MIGHT work......and are very easy to try...so easy, you probably already HAVE tried them.

1. Put a fairly strong magnet to the broken off Allen-wrench end and see if you can pull it out using the magnet. The small magnets on telescoping rods used by auto mechanics to fish dropped screws out of crannies in auto engines often work well for me.

2. Sometimes the Allen-wrenches themselves are magnetized (making it easy for one to guide the screw to the hole in tight spots). If that is the case, it is likely holding itself in there by magnetic force. In that case, if you have one of the handy small demagnetizers, you can run the assembly nto that and maybe afterwards it will just fall out. Or, you could try putting a magnet to the part (the part, not the broken off wrench end), using first one pole (one end of the magnet), then the other. As "likes" repel each other, that might cause a magnetized wrench end to lose its grip and fall out.

quote:

Originally posted by malm:
Find someone with a TIG welder and get them to stick the tungsten to the broken piece. Works every time.

This works !! I have done it many times.