John's Blog

This is a flashback article.

Fastener heads don’t stay pristine forever. After much use the head can wear to the point where your screwdriver or other fastener removal tool just spins around while the worn fastener doesn’t turn at all.

Many of the fasteners on the skin of an F-16 look like the ones in this picture. I estimate there’s around a thousand of ‘em on an F-16, plenty of opportunity for a fastener head to eventually become stripped.

When that happens you reach for a Johnson Bar. Here’s a Johnson Bar being put put to good use. During my career I heard of (or personally experienced) very few fasteners that a Johnson Bar couldn’t remove. They’re pricey, clanky, beautifully designed tools.

What sucked is when the hexagonal tip of your screw remover broke off inside the head of the fastener and became wedged inside. Sometimes that small tip would get stuck inside the head of the screw and No amount of harsh language or gentle tapping on the screw head would free it up. Those tips are hardened steel and no Johnson Bar on earth will help. When that happens you create a job for the sheet metal shop, a person that specializes in solving such problems would eventually stop by and remove the fastener.

I recently had the opportunity to ‘remote in’ to help remove a fastener with a stripped head. I honestly found myself thinking, “If only I was there and had a Johnson Bar, that screw would be out in a minute.”

Surprising to me… I found just one YouTube video on how to use a Johnson Bar, affectionately named “El Brutus”: