Help! Seat belt fasteners are stuck!

[Ben_Greenberg]

Hey guys I'm in the middle of trying to replace the fasteners holding my stock seat belts in place. This is for my 78 c15 heavy half with a bench seat.They are t50 torx head bolts. I got one out no problem, 2 of them won't budge (broke one t50 on it) and the other one is now totally stripped out. Any recommendations? The one on the passenger side is really stuck and the underside is right above the gas tank. I'd rather not use a tactic that requires applying heat if I can avoid it at least for that bolt. Thanks in advance guys!

[jaredts]

I've drilled out several of these, but they don't drill easily.  If you can soak them with PB blaster or other penetrating oil for a couple of days and then try again that would be my first try.  You can beat the top of the bolt repeatedly with a hammer to try and break the corrosion loose.  Grind a flat on each side so a regular wrench fits on it, there's a lot of tricks, which may all fail.

[pcguysam]

Use some kind of impact ratchet or drill on the one(s) that aren't stripped already and see if they'll loosen up.  Spray them with some liquid wrench to dry and get them to loosen up.  On the one that's stripped, you've got to figure out a way to drill it out.  Maybe slice into it with a grinder cut off wheel and try to make a slot so that you can get a large flat head bit of some kind into it.  Otherwise, just drill it completely out, although with that diameter it will take some time and patience.  Good luck!  Frozen bolts are no fun.

[Ben_Greenberg]

Thanks guys, I am going to try Jared's idea. I'm going to cut off two sides of the head and try to work it out with a combination wrench or vise grips. If that doesn't work... Careful work with some drills. Any other ideas, I'm all ears. Thanks again guys!

[Ben_Greenberg]

Alright! New seatbelts are in. I had to try a little bit of everything on this one!

1 bolt came right out with some penetrating oil.

1 bolt came out after I it two sides of the head so that I could grip it with channel lock pliers and after about 15 minutes of turning it came out.

The other two I had to drill out. One by the passenger side door I had to be super careful as the gas tank is underneath. The other one was much simpler. Nothing underneath and I could attack it from both sides.

All in all it was a nightmare but thanks to your suggestions I am done with that project and can now move on to better things.