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Prepping Treehopper bolts

weekender21

weekender21

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Joined
Aug 19, 2018
Messages
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Location
Hawaii and North Carolina
Purchased 50 bolts from Treehopper. Any preparation required? Not looking to dip them in anything. These will stay in the tree through December.


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I have been using Treehopers for many years and I have never done anything to them. They stand up great in weather. If you are using them year after year in the same tree make sure you back them out with an allen wrench about a half inch at the end of the season due to tree growth. They will get swallowed up by the tree over time.
 
Sounds good. Do you remove the oily coating or use as is? Any issues with rust?

f04fe82201fe6535060d4983079a00ab.jpg



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What do they get for say, 20 of those bolts?


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They are steel and do rust but they last a long time. Especially if you pull them after season. There are guys that have been using the same bolts for years. Mine actually came with a line x type coating on them. If you did that it would probably minimize any rust if your worried
 
Murph4028 said:
They are steel and do rust but they last a long time. Especially if you pull them after season. There are guys that have been using the same bolts for years. Mine actually came with a line x type coating on them. If you did that it would probably minimize any rust if your worried
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I have a set of the coated bolts for run and gun and will use them as the bottom 4 on my pre sets. I purchased 50 non coated bolts for pre sets. Much cheaper than the coated bolts.

Just curious what everyone’s been doing for prep on the non coated to make them last a little longer. Not too worried about rust, could always Ospho and paint later.

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Last edited:
weekender21 said:
Sounds good. Do you remove the oily coating or use as is? Any issues with rust?

f04fe82201fe6535060d4983079a00ab.jpg



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Click to expand...
I split an order of 300 with a couple buddies.
I wasn't going to live with the oil on them so I de-oiled them which was a bit of a chore the way I chose to. I thought I could just soak them in detergent. That didn't work very well. Even after de-oiling them, they still had a black film on them that could be wiped off. And since I wanted to paint them, I thought the paint wouldn't adhere well unless the bolts were perfectly clean. I got anal about it. I de-oiled and wiped every bolt before I painted them. But it was amazing how fast they will rust after the oil is removed. Within an hour, they were starting to get a film of rust. I'm convinced that taking them to the car wash and power washing with soap solution would be better for de-oiling than soaking and rinsing. I'm not sure what is the best method to remove the black film on them. One thing I tried that worked well was to chuck them in a drill and rotate while scuffing with scotch bright pad, then spray painting. It was a bit of effort to prep them, but they are now painted and odorless and rust won't be an issue.
One other thing...round headed bolts are a pain to paint as compared to painting hex heads. Hex will remain in the exact position in order to get paint uniform on the entire bolt. Round head bolts want to roll when you flip them over.
 
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