Spring Plate Removal Help Please

[Brucewing]

So is there some sort of magic to get this out?

Any suggestions or tips would be greatly appreciated.

Bruce

[edmayo]

Crow foot pry bar, pry the cap off the spring plate

[76911S]

Ed is right, but I will try to add a little more. I assume you are trying to remove the whole spring plate / torsion bar?

Use a pry bar to remove the cap, work your way around it. They are usually not much trouble. Then comes the hard part. Pry the spring plate out of it's hole, again work you way around. A wood block under your pry bar will help prevent causing any damage to the tub. Often times the torsion bar is frozen to the spring plate due to age / rust etc. I have had success clamping vise grips to the T bar and banging on it with a hammer forcing it back in the tub hole while holding the spring plate out. But more often than not, you need to drill a hole in the spring plate cap and put a punch through the hole and hit it with a hammer to release the T bar. Once the hole is drilled you can spray some magic stuff in the hole and help with the release. Afterwards, you can weld up the hole.

Not a fun job, hopefully yours has been out in the past and is not to stuck.

Mark..

[smedley]

The end cap insert is nothing more than an old fashioned freeze plug...available at any auto parts store. Drill it and use a punch to leverage it out. then you have full access to the end of the T bar. With full access to the end you have more options for loosening things up...big hammer, or even the jaws of a puller will fit over the spring plate edges to separate the bar and spring plate. The cover is the easy part...gentle prying.

[gled49]

You should measure spring plate angle at this point for reference.

[Brucewing]

Perfect advice, after some prying and a little tap tap tap with my BFH and bar all is well.

Thank you everyone for this advice.