Hinge bolts backing plate pain

[paulbaylis]

Yep, I managed to undo the front door hinge bolts on my Morrie 1000 all the way and the backing plate dropped to the bottom of the cavity. I managed to finesse it back into position after a couple of hours with thin screwdrivers and the holes lined up, but I can't thread a bolt into any of the holes because the backing plate just gets pushed to the back of the cavity where the short bolts can't reach. I even cut a square out of the interior side panel to see if I could get to the plate from the back, but in case this is useful information to anybody, that panel leads nowhere. I'm going to order a longer 5/16 BSF bolt to try and catch a thread, but before I do I was wondering if anybody has faced and overcome such a egregious time-wasting hassle. I had to restrain myself from using ruder words there.

[myoldjalopy]

Could the 90 degree bend on an allen key help hold the plate in situ while you get the bolt to screw in? Just a thought...........

[philthehill]

Thank you for the tip.
It is best to use two lengths of 5/16" BSF threaded bar which are threaded into the backing plate holes as and when the hinge bolts are removed. The threaded bar not having a head allows the hinge to be removed once the additional two bolts are removed.

[paulbaylis]

Could the 90 degree bend on an allen key help hold the plate in situ while you get the bolt to screw in? Just a thought...........

Not a bad idea. My allen keys would be too short as the plate is current hanging on three screwdrivers towards the back of the cavity, but a bent over coat hanger wire might work.

[myoldjalopy]

Well do let us know how you solve this problem when you do.........

[paulbaylis]

Resolved. Here's what I did:

Luckily it was the bottom hinge, and part of the plate was still visible after it fell to the bottom, which meant I could get two thin screwdrivers through the holes to ease it back up into a position where I could get at least one plate hole to line up with its pillar hole. Select a Phillips screwdriver that's as close to the diameter of the hole as possible to make lining up the other holes easier. Once lined up, I could poke the screwdriver through the lot.

Tricky part was keeping a hold of that screwdriver while lining up the other holes. Finally, you end up with three Phillips screwdrivers holding the plate back in position. I had to keep the screwdrivers pushed hard against the back wall of the cavity. Last thing you want is the thing falling back down after all that work. The other painful part of this process was that there's no way you can see when the bolt hole finally lines up without using a light and peering through the holes.

So now the plate is lined up, but it is nowhere near the pillar. So you need some way to pull the plate towards the pillar before you can get a bolt in. If you had a long length of 5/16 BSF threaded rod, you could try and thread it into one of the holes at this stage and the job would be a LOT easier. If you're stuck with just the original bolts, as I was, the plate needs to be held firmly against the pillar or screwing in a bolt just pushes the plate back away from the pillar. One of the bolts was longer than the others, so my plan was to use this one first. This was probably the most difficult part of the whole process as you have to ensure your three screwdrivers are kept in place at all times while doing other things.

I bent up two lengths of thick wire with a radiused hook on the end. Goal is to have a hook that you can insert through both layers of holes and up the back of the plate. Wire has to be thick enough to tolerate pulling pressure while not allowing the hook to straighten under that pressure. The wire also has to be long enough so you can grip the hook at a distance from the pillar, as you may need to position yourself away from the pillar from time to time, e.g. when peering through the holes while holding a light to line them up (while holding the two wires!!). Put a bend at the holding end of the wire on the same plane as the bend at the hooking end. That gives you something to grip as well as indicating the orientation of the hook once it's behind the plate. Never let the hook rotate below vertical. You also want to be hooking a top and bottom hole, leaving the middle hole as the hole you'll be bolting first. That way, there's less chance of the bolt cross-threading, or just not wanting to thread, when you finally get into a bolting position. I tested and refined my hooks on an upper hinge bolt hole to make sure it worked BEFORE trying it on the problem hinge. One I was satisfied with the hooks, I removed the lower screwdriver (very carefully, while pushing hard against the other two) and inserted the wire hook. This took multiple attempts as the plate decoupled from one of the screwdrivers a few times and I had to repeat the lining up process. You need a ton of patience. Finally, after much pain, I had two hooks in top and bottom holes respectively that could pull the plate against the pillar. Not so easy still because the thin wire allowed too much slack compared to the screwdrivers and the holes were not lined up enough to just thread a bolt into the remaining hole. This is where you ideally need an extra hand because you have to pull on both those wires while jimmying the plate into a position where the middle holes are all lined up, while holding a light and bending over to peer through the holes to check alignment. Excruciating.

So, I'm at the point where my back is aching from being constantly bent over and I finally see the middle holes lined up perfectly. If I even slightly move the hand holding the two wires, it's back to square one, so I grab the bolt, shove it in the hole and start screwing and praying. And praise the Lord, the bolt screwed in! Safe to say I shan't be repeating that mistake again.

[paulbaylis]

Well do let us know how you solve this problem when you do.........

Finally got it done! Thanks for the initial suggestion. I've written up the whole painful saga. Lesson learned the hard way.

[Boomlander]

Well done, we've all been there and as always we learn from experience in solving the problem.

[myoldjalopy]

Well done Paul.Glad its sorted - sounds like a bit of a nightmare but your persistence and ingenuity paid off. The worst jobs are those where you have to be a bit of a contortionist to do them!