Best way to get a half inch bolt out of a pipe

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zappy

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CA.
4 inch rigid riser coming out of the concrete. The 90 is PVC just the riser is rigid. Half-inch bolt fell in the pipe. I'll take the blame ?. Thank you for your help.
 
So you're saying a smaller piece of PVC conduit and put a magnet inside of it and drop it down
With a string
 
Use a fiberglass fish tape instead of string. The magnet will still be attracted to the rigid riser and may have too much friction against the PVC sleeve to 'fall' through it.
 
Good enough magnet should hold on to the bolt even while dragging up the magnetic sides, but I like the idea of the nonmagnetic sleeve. Might be a little tricky getting the bolt to transition into the sleeve. Maybe put a sharp taper on the inside diameter of the sleeve to help, so you don't have a sharp shoulder trying to push something back off the magnet.

Or glue a nut to the end of a 1/2" rope. This should be rigid enough so you can twist the nut onto the bolt when you get it to the bottom. :p
 
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Use a fiberglass fish tape instead of string. The magnet will still be attracted to the rigid riser and may have too much friction against the PVC sleeve to 'fall' through it.

Ooooh, good point. I skipped that part of the problem.

If the sleeve is narrow enough and the 4" rigid short enough, you should be able to center it and play with it enough to get the magnet to fall enough at a time and to the bottom, I would think. But then the trick might be to give it enough momentum to fall as far down past the elbow as the bolt went...
 
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@ days ago one of my men dropped his screwdriver in a 2" pvc conduit. Fortunately, that was easy to retrieve. I also agree a magnet.
 
Put a mandrel (or even just a rag) into the pipe from the other end and pull it through. Assuming you have or can fit a pull string or tape.
 
Use a fiberglass fish tape instead of string. The magnet will still be attracted to the rigid riser and may have too much friction against the PVC sleeve to 'fall' through it.
Have the magnet through the sleeve before inserting sleeve. Have it just beyond lip so you can push it down when it drags.
 
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