Help! Stripped steering knuckle on fabtech lift!

I need advice. When changing the lower ball joint in my 1st gen, two of the four bolts that connect the LBJ to the steering knuckle messed up. Basically it gets tight and then loosens up like it is crossed or not seated properly. When I pull the bolt out I find that the cast iron is being shreded into and left in the threads of the bolts. The bolt still has to be screwed out, you can't just pull it out.

Is there any way to remedy this? Can I re-thread the knuckle or am I pretty much screwed? I've heard you can't re-thread the cast. And it seems impossible to find a spare fabtech knuckle. It's seeming like my only options are to either buy a new fabtech kit, weld a new cross memeber in and go back to stock, or straight axle it?

 

You could try tapping it out to the next size bigger bolt.

 

I was told you couldn't do that due to the material of the knuckle? I'll look into it further. Hopefully it'll be that easy.

 

Heliocoil, new used knuckle - @jbrandt went through this recently.

 

I'll look into this- thanks!

 

what material is it? Jeep guys do it all the time

 

From fabtech: Massive extended length ductile iron steering knuckles"

 

Have you tried Fabtech to see if they will sell a single piece... if not try Kartek Off Road.

 

Actually, I lucked out, onlt stripped the first few threads with a bolt that was too short. Got the right bolts and cleaned up the threads and it torqued right up to spec.

 

I dropped the spindle off at a machine shop. Mine kept pulling threads out and were left wrapped around the bolt so I think I was beyond be able to just use longer bolts. They're going to use a helicoil to maintain the ability to use OEM sized hardware.

Probably should've tried longer bolts first. But with it bringing out threads with the bolt I was just over it lol

 

Update: Got a call back from the Machine shop saying they couldn't get the new UBJ pressed in and that all they needed to do was re-tap the current holes a little deeper for longer bolts. They also did the work for FREEEEE since they couldn't get the new UBJ in. Ended up taking that to another shop and they charged me $6 to press it on and had it done in about 10 minutes.

Stoked that it's finally all coming together and that I'll have my truck back soon!