e-man

Guys, I am in a bit of a pickle. I removed my rear license plate from my car last night, and in doing so I sheared off the plastic screws in the holes (yes, the screws were plastic and not metal, no idea why they were plastic). Anyway, how in the heck can I get the screws out of the holes? Is there a way to get at the screws from the inside of the trunk?

Kuleaze

Go to your local hardware store and buy a tap. You basically drill a little hole in the screw itself, then use a tap which has reverse threads, then you simply screw the tap in counter clockwise and once it won't go any further into the hole, it will start to back out the screw...

e-man

Brilliant. Thank you very much.

ibidu1

iTrader: (1)

This would work for a metal screw but a plastic screw I doubt it would take it out.

What you could do is take a very small drill bit. drill out the center. With the drill bit melt the plastic, take a smaller size screw use that to clean out the melted plastics.

BinaryJay

Try scoring the sheared off end of the plastic screw, mist water on it... apply some very good super glue/exoxy and bond a "handle" to it (or the remainder of the screw). Plastic and (good) superglues and epoxies bond very strongly, it might be enough to get 'em out.

You can also use a dremel/rotary tool to "draw" a deep line in the screw so you can just insert a flathead and turn it out with a screwdriver.