A little update to last week's post

Since originally posting this guide several owners, including myself, have come across an issue when removing the lower dome head on the side panel. 

When undoing the screw the captive nut sometimes spins meaning that it’s not possible to remove the screw, unfortunately access to the back of the panel is very restricted so seeing it, let alone holding the captive nut to undo the screw is very difficult.

The captive nut is oval shaped and should be held in a similar shaped recess within the panel. However if the screw is slightly too tight the captive nut itself turns, distorts the sides of the recess,and allows the captive nut to spin. 

I don’t think this is even always a case of someone being ham fisted either, its not a great idea in the first place. Also the screw is stainless steel and without any lubrication these screws have a tendency to pick up in threads, it really doesnt take much to cause this problem.

There are several posts relating to this and a few different methods people used to remove the screw so I thought I’d add the method I used to this post.

Firstly I removed all the other screws and clips retaining the panel to give me as much give in the panel as possible.

I then removed the radiator side panel. (This is to allow a little more access for the next stage, it may be possible to do it without removing this) After removing the 2 screws there’s a tab that locates under the side panel, its possible to gently pull the side panel out to give enough clearance to unhook the tab and remove the Radiator Side Panel completely. 

Now we come to undoing the offending screw.

I pulled the side panel out just enough the get a very small allen key behind the panel into the area of the captive nut.

Then whilst slowly turning the screw I moved the end of the allen key around until I managed to get the end or the key between the side of the oval part of the captive nut and the sidewall of the recess. 

This stopped the nut from turning and the allowed me to undo the screw.

These pictures were taken after the removal and are for reference only.

Ive now used an epoxy (I used JB Weld ) to fix the captive nut in place to avoid this happening again. Personally I would do this regardless of having an issue as to sort this problem out is very time consuming and there’s always a risk of damaging something or not being able to get the screw out at all. (Ive now pt epoxy on both sides and only had an issue on one of them).

However a must do is to use copperslip or similar on these screw threads and be very light handed tightening them.

Hope this is of use to someone.