Magnetic Drain Plug Snapped in Half

[joshuaho96]

10 hours ago, Duncan said:

not really....in that it is possible but it would be easier to pull the motor than to take the sump off in the car.  It's not just that the diff is attached because you remove the axles and driveshaft, but you have to remove the whole subframe to get it out which is a heap of work including brake calipers and steering rack disconnected, have to support the engine from above because the engine mounts to the subframe etc etc

Also, at that point if the engine support stand slips I hope you can bench press 200+kg of RB26. Considering the oil pan has to be RTVed on as well which has like a 15 minute working time between the first drop coming out of the tube to fully torqued to spec I would probably never attempt pulling the oil pan unless the engine is on a proper stand.

[r32-25t]

You also have to pull the box out to take the sump off an rb26 because a few of the bolts are inside the belhousing. 
 

just put something long and metal through the sump plug hole till it attaches to it and take it out through the hole 

the real lesson to learnt here for everyone is don’t use cheap parts because they end up costing more in the long run 

[Duncan]

1 hour ago, r32-25t said:

You also have to pull the box out to take the sump off an rb26 because a few of the bolts are inside the belhousing. 

That bit at least you can fit by drilling a couple of clearance holes in the sump webbing to get a socket in there

[Watermouse]

Maybe try a rare earth magnet to coax to the drain hole. They aren’t expensive and damn powerful. Sorry if this has already been covered

[kevboost7]

Update: I got the magnet out. I bought 3 different flexible magnetic reach tools, but none of them worked. The magnet on the tip was all less than 2lbs of force, so i had to buy a special cylindrical magnet that had a pull force of 9lbs. 

The magnet finally came in the mail yesterday, so i got under the car to get to work. The super strong magnet isn't that long, so i only have about 1 finger pinch lengths to hold it. I was so scared when i was going in the hole, that the 9lb magnet would just fly away inside the oil pan never to be seen again, but i had my butt cheeks clenched and finger gripped on that thing so tight, i managed to get it to suck the other magnet out. 

It was a victory for me last night. 

       

[The Bogan]

[joshuaho96]

7 hours ago, kevboost7 said:

Update: I got the magnet out. I bought 3 different flexible magnetic reach tools, but none of them worked. The magnet on the tip was all less than 2lbs of force, so i had to buy a special cylindrical magnet that had a pull force of 9lbs. 

The magnet finally came in the mail yesterday, so i got under the car to get to work. The super strong magnet isn't that long, so i only have about 1 finger pinch lengths to hold it. I was so scared when i was going in the hole, that the 9lb magnet would just fly away inside the oil pan never to be seen again, but i had my butt cheeks clenched and finger gripped on that thing so tight, i managed to get it to suck the other magnet out. 

It was a victory for me last night. 

       

I have to say, I was briefly considering getting a magnetic drain plug but never could be bothered out of laziness/cheapness and now I'm very glad I didn't.

[MBS206]

3 minutes ago, joshuaho96 said:

I have to say, I was briefly considering getting a magnetic drain plug but never could be bothered out of laziness/cheapness and now I'm very glad I didn't.

Magnetic drain plugs are fine. Just don't buy cheap shit ones. They're actually better than letting magnetic shit float around in your oil.

The magnet also didn't just "fall out". OP was drilling the plug out which allowed it to come out.

Even some OEM plugs are magnetic.

[r32-25t]

If a magnet doesn’t stick to anything except another magnet then it’s not a very good magnet and is probably just a piece of steel 

[joshuaho96]

7 hours ago, MBS206 said:

Magnetic drain plugs are fine. Just don't buy cheap shit ones. They're actually better than letting magnetic shit float around in your oil.

The magnet also didn't just "fall out". OP was drilling the plug out which allowed it to come out.

Even some OEM plugs are magnetic.

I'm not doubting it does something, there's clearly a reason why Nissan bothered with it on the transmission/diff/transfer case but it's more just the effort of finding a drain plug that isn't going to have some unexpected design problem that makes me lazy. For example even the Nismo branded ones here spec way less than the factory 20 N-m. They say only torque to 10 N-m. That is getting absolutely trashed the moment you take it to any mechanic who isn't familiar with the specific requirements and assumes it should be torqued to factory spec.

[MBS206]

52 minutes ago, joshuaho96 said:

I'm not doubting it does something, there's clearly a reason why Nissan bothered with it on the transmission/diff/transfer case but it's more just the effort of finding a drain plug that isn't going to have some unexpected design problem that makes me lazy. For example even the Nismo branded ones here spec way less than the factory 20 N-m. They say only torque to 10 N-m. That is getting absolutely trashed the moment you take it to any mechanic who isn't familiar with the specific requirements and assumes it should be torqued to factory spec.

I thought you didn't let mechanics, especially those with no idea, work on your car any more? Wouldn't that mean it won't be an issue in your case?

[joshuaho96]

45 minutes ago, MBS206 said:

I thought you didn't let mechanics, especially those with no idea, work on your car any more? Wouldn't that mean it won't be an issue in your case?

Sure, but why assume that will be the case forever? And why assume you'll be able to do an oil change to swap back to a stock drain bolt before that happens? And does it even matter when I change the oil at fairly short intervals? Life can be funny sometimes and unexpected things can happen. Like breaking a collarbone so you can't do any work on your car for a few months but the oil change is due so you have to take it to somewhere and hope they don't do something stupid like stacking the new drain plug washer on top of the old one.

[kevboost7]

Looking back, I’m pretty sure I over-torqued the magnetic drain plug because I was trying to fully crush the copper washer. In hindsight, I definitely should’ve used a torque wrench.

Either way, I ended up switching to a regular drain plug so I don’t have to deal with this kind of issue again.

Big thanks to everyone on the forum for your support—I actually talk about you guys to my friends and coworkers