The Steel Guitar Forum

The 4 split screws on my ETS pedal steel are stuck and cannot be turned.
They are very small and so is the allan key. I am scared to use too much force and do damage. A little oil did not help.
Any suggestions?

There are products made to loosen stuck screws such as kroil & liquid wrench. If they don't work you might need a little heat. Aluminum expands readily and a hair drier should do the job. Just don't over do it.

Check your tool to be certain that the six corners that enter the
screw are not 'rounded' from extended use.

If so, replace the tool or, cut off the 'smoothed over' section such
that the edges nearest the end are crisp.

Not all allen wrenches are the same build . . some are made of harder
steel that others. Be sure you have one of the former.

When trying to break free the screw, give the tool a sharp turn as
opposed to turning it slowly.

Be certain that there is no 'foreign material' built up in the hex-cavity
of the screw . . if so, clear it out such that your tool, when inserted,
goes in the full length.

Thanks Russ, I made sure that the allan wrench never slipped, so it fits all screws the same. No damage on the screws and wrench. In addition, the guitar is not old and the visible screw thread is very clean.
To loosen the screw I also carefully tapped the allan wrench, just in case the steel metal split screws adhered to the aluminum metal block.
The small wrench is so thin that it twists while turning it.
These split screws are very tiny. Nothing robust like the normal PSG screws.
The clean screw of string 9 on the picture is stuck. String 5 shows what the screw head looks like. The wrench came with the guitar. The wrench size is between 1/16 (too small) and 5/64 (too big). No metric wrenches fitted.

In the meantime, I got the tunings of string 2 and string 9 improved by working with the slacks of 2 and 9, controlled by the nylon hex.

Tapping the tool into the screw is good, I had forgotten about that.

I'm not clear, from your post, whether the stuck screw loosened for you or not.

I can't imagine what hex-size it is meant to be if it's in between 64ths and not metric.

Could it be that the hex-hole in the screw has 'wallowed out' from trying over and over?

I have had this occur and to resolve it, I took a hex-wrench the next size larger and, by
trial-and-error and reckoning, used a grinding wheel on the flats of the 'business end' of the
tool to taper down three adjacent flats, giving the tool a very tight fit in the opening of the screw.
While applying pressure to turn the tool, it might have needed some tapping to keep it tight.

That 'did the trick' although the grinding is tedious. Be prepared to use more than one 'sacrificial' tool!

In the grinding process, you want more of a gentle, or slight, rather than a great, angle of taper.

Other than or in addition to that, a heat gun would be helpful. You would want to fashion a deflector to
be certain that the heat doesn't get where it shouldn't be.

The wrench still has a good grip without wallowing out the screws. The reason is that the wrench is so thin that excessive forces seem to be too risky, especially for your hands as it almost cut through the skin a couple of times.
So I now use pliers to grip the wrench. I only managed to get string 6 loose.
My next step will be to use a soldering iron and carefully hold it against a spare allan wrench to focus the heat on the screws only. No heat on the surrounding environment, only on the screw. We'll see what happens.

Peter den Hartogh wrote: . . focus the heat on the screws only. No heat on the surrounding environment, only on the screw. We'll see what happens.

Since heat causes things to expand (get larger) the screw will only become tighter yet.

Heat the piece that surrounds the screw.

It is unavoidable to heat the piece with the internal threads and not get some heat on the screw, but worth an effort to try.

I doubt a soldering iron will suffice. Depends on the wattage and how long you apply it.

A heat gun will do.

Have you tried any liquid products other than oil?

I agree with Russ - heat the aluminum, not the screw. In fact you should try leaving the wrench in the screw socket in order to keep the screw as cool as possible. Shield it from the heat of course. You should not have to heat the aluminum very much, just get it warmer than the screw.
I had a stuck screw on a bell-crank in my ETS. I used a big soldering iron to heat the bell-crank right near the screw & was able to get it out easy. The screw appeared to have locktight or something on it

Lee, here in Cape Town, South Africa, it is not so easy to find the right liquid product.

Russ and Eric, I will borrow a heatgun and let you know the result. Will the strings suffer from a bit of heat?
Eric, the ETS is my favorite guitar.

I would tape some cardboard around the body and changer fingers, etc. Everywhere you don't want the heat. Heat a little at a time.
My ETS is an amazingly light & nice playing & sounding steel. (But my ZB is my fave!)