1st Gen Captain Seat Arm Rests

Hello All, this is my first time reaching out any help is much appreciated.
Just had my front captain seats recovered in leather and the drivers seat arm rest bolt was evidently cross threaded. I have acquired a new bolt from a salvage yard as they are a discontinued part from Toyota.
My issue now is the internal female threads in the seat. Seems the treads are quite stripped out and the bolt won't grab any threads. I thought about helicoils, but am open to any ideas.
Thanks in advance.

 

Have you tried cleaning out and retapping the threads in the seat?

 

Yes, I did. The threads/ opening in the seat is larger than the OEM bolt.

 

If tap/rethread/thread cleanout doesn't work...

Measure the OEM bolt length and find the threading using any threading gauge (every hardware store with bolt bins has gauges near/on the bins).

Find the next step up in bolt thread size, and buy a bolt in that thread with OEM bolt length, same style shank of course.

Make sure you have a tap for that size, as I assume you have a tap/die set from your last response, if not, acquire said tap.

Drill out to the apporpiate diameter for that tap. Tap the hole. Install the new bolt.

I'm going to assume there's enough metal for this. You should be taking off less than 1mm on either side, I can't imagine there's not enough, for a bracket I assume will be solid steel.

YMMV, proceed at your own risk, I'm only telling you what *I* would do in your situation.

 

Appreciate that shifty'. That's what I was trying to get around doing.
Just hoping someone had a cheat code for this. Ha!
Looks like I have a weekend project, probably a 2-3 barley-pop job.

 

It's too bad you're way south of me, I BELIEVE I still have a driver's seat back frame in the attic (I got it from DK to steal the seat bottom and I was going to give the remnants to Frank or AssDog but they went a different route). It also may have gone to scrap, but I'll look. I can check when I get home. May be an option for you.

 

Hey Mamba, appreciate the thought/ effort.
No need to go looking for it, I'm going to either fill & tap the hole for the OEM bolt or drill it out and get a larger bolt.

 

I can't believe I'm even saying this out loud, but I'd give JB Weld a shot first... Can't think of any reason why it would hurt anything and worst case is you're just back where you are now. Put some JB Weld in there, re-tap it, and say some prayers. Another potential option would be TimeSert (which I think would be better than helicoil for that application).

Edit - If you remove the cover and foam, you could also try to re-fill and tap by welding some filler in the hole. Definitely more work/effort than JB Weld though.

 

Teutonics, I had the same idea but wasn't going to say it out loud either. My thoughts exactly, it is just going to hold my elbow and if it fails, I'll fill it with metal and tap it again.

 

Howdy howdy, been a bit since I touched on this but had some other mechanical work done and finally got around to addressing the arm rest.
I ended up trying JB weld and so far it is working.
I liberally loaded up the bolt & female threads with JB (the original two part grey) and ratchet strapped the arm rest in place. l prayed for 24 hours while it cured. Once cured, it was still a bit loose though, meaning it would swing up & down passed dowel stop pin. I gingerly loosened then tightened the bolt to where it would engage the dowel stop pin and low & behold I now have a functional arm rest again. Not sure how long it will last but I’ll post again in a month or two after some use to let everyone know.