I spoke with you earlier this week about breaking a Grabit® extractor off in a bolt. Thanks so much for your response. In my day job, I manage a group of professionals who manage formal client complaints for IBM . So, I'm all about client satisfaction. With your response, obviously, you are all about client sat[isfaction] as well!
First, in no way do I feel the breakage was a defect in your Grabit® product. I was the defect...too many hours hanging over the fender of a car for an old guy. In a late night rush, I used the wrong size Grabit® (for a 3/8" bolt) and then tried to turn the extractor too quickly. In any case, just for the record, and to help you guys should other customers ever call in with a similar problem, I'll share my story once more with you.
The problem was that I broke the tip of an 8502P [meant for screws] off in a 3/8" bolt. After multiple failed attempts to redrill the bolt with various size (small to large) carbide and cobalt bits, I had nothing to lose, so I pulled out my die grinder with a pointed stone bit. (I actually went [through] several of these stone grinder bits.) I very carefully ground the center of the 3/8" bolt out. As I ground, I saw continual sparks. The sparks were no doubt pieces of the Grabit® being kicked out. Ultimately, I ground deep enough to remove all the hardened Grabit® material. I then redrilled the bolt and used a larger Grabit®-Pro. Once the Pro was seated, within 1/4 of a turn, I could screw the broken bolt out by hand...amazing.
I've even attached some pics for you!
After previously success using your Grabit on several screws, I was already a fan of your product, but from here on out, I'll be an evangelist. Feel free to use my comments for any testimonials. Your product is great...if you use it for the correct application. Thanks for spending the time to talk with me.
Larry M.
Wake Forest, NC
Greatest tool ever!!! Saved me HOURS of work! And yes you may post it.
Peter C.
Fairfield, CT
I just wanted to commend your company on making a great, superior quality, American made product. It worked just as the package described with no problems. I have stripped screws many times over the years and just had to leave it that way. Now I know when I have a stripped screw I can just get out my Grabit®-Pro kit. Keep up the good work, we need good American companies. Thank You.
Kim K.
I was up at 3 o'clock in the morning a couple of weeks ago and saw an ad for the "Grabit®" which is sort of the same thing as an EZ-out. It was $20 so I figured what the hell, picked up the phone and ordered it. It came in the mail yesterday and I gave it a shot today. I was surprised to find that it actually worked better than I thought it would. I pulled out four 3" coarse thread deck screws that were stripped in a piece of oak in about two minutes. It wasn't advertised to work in steel but I figured I'd give it a shot anyway. It removed sheetmetal screws with no problem, but I was unable to remove a broken ¼" bolt that had broken in a piece of 1/8" angle iron.
I obviously have no interest in the marketing of the Grabit®, I just wanted to pass along a review of a tool that actually worked and did what it said it would do. Sure there are many other products that would do the same thing. But for $20 I figured it was worth the money.
Username: DaSouthWon
See the orignial
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How many times have you ever tightened a screw, only to realize you went too far and stripped the screw? How many times have you tried to loosen a screw only to find that it was rusty and you stripped it? How many times, ok we will shut up, you get the point. No matter how good you are, there are times you will strip a screw, it is just the way the world is. While some people deal with broken pencils, we deal with stripped screws and bolts. Well let us introduce the Grabit®-Pro by Alden. The Grabit® can save you a lot of time, but most importantly, it saves you a lot of frustration.
If you are not familiar with Grabit® or a screw extractor system, the Grabit® is a two step process. First a user will use one side of the bit to drill a shallow hole into the head of the screw or bolt. Then the user flips the bit over and drills the screw out. The bit actually sits in the first hole and grips the side of the screw to extract it. Yes it is that simple. Just remember you are extracting a screw, so make sure your drill is in reverse when you use the system.
We started to hear about the Grabit®-Pro, so we went to our local big box store and bought the Alden Grabit®-Pro set model number 8430P. This set comes with three screws and bolt extractors. The bits are self centering, so you don't get any walking or wondering. Since you are using this system metal on metal, one of them will have to give. In order to make sure the Grabit® system doesn't wear out first, Alden uses a system where the metal is tempered twice for extra hardness. The bits are made from M2 HSS steel. What we like best is that they are made right here in the good old USA.
You can use it on damaged screws such as Phillips, torxs, square drives, plastic or metal screws up to 3". A user can not only use these on a cheap soft screws, but it will work up to grade 8 or 19.9 fasteners. You can also use this on bolts sizes 10 - 5/16" which is 5mm - 10 mm. We headed back to the marina to find some good screws and bolts we could test the system on. We used the Grabit® on a lot of bolts and screws and each time it performed perfect. We probably found about twenty different screws and bolts we could actually test it on. There were a couple of times it didn't work, such as when we drilled down too far and the head of the screw broke off, but we are going to chalk that up to user error. We made a small little video below, so you can see the Grabit®-Pro in action. For the video we drove a couple 3" screws into some wood. We then stripped the heck out of the heads. As you can see the Grabit® system didn't take long before we were able to extract the screw and get onto the next screw.
The Grabit®-Pro system is great. Very easy to work with and great results. While there were a couple times we couldn't get the screw out, which was more due to user error, the screw extractor worked great. Most importantly it will save you a lot of frustration and aggravation, which you can save up for this year when the cubs let us down again.
Long Term Note - Today 2/19/11 we were using the Dewalt 12V Max screwdriver and ended up breaking one of the Grabit® tips. We first started using the Grabit® on 2/1/11 and have taken out about 30 screws. We still think the Grabit® is a tool everyone must have in their tool arsenal.
UserNme: ToolMan
Original Posting on
CanadaNewsReport.com
3/1/11
Accessed 4/3/11
Page has since been taken down
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