in this video I'm going to take a look at removing some damaged screws I've actually driven all eight of these into this metal plate it has been tapped and countersunk I've then rounded off each of the heads by using the incorrect driver for it these werel actually Phillips head which require a bit like that which is a Phillips bit ph2 and to round them off I used a PZ 2 and actually did that by turning them in the right direction which will tighten them so all of these screws are very tight and all of the heads have been damaged so much that you can't remove them with the correct bit I'll just demonstrate that for you can see that it's not chance at all of that on doing any of them because it can't grip any of the heads this is a very common problem when you come to remove a Euro cylinder from a uPVC door you'll often find that people have chewed up the screws which can make it very difficult to remove them sometimes it's very easy and sometimes it is very difficult it depends there are quite a lot of variables it may surprise you but one of the techniques that I tend to try first is an elastic band I actually saw this on somebody else's YouTube channel and I watched it and I didn't that's the think it would work and then I went to a friend's house who had a rounded off screw like that in a Euro cylinder I use the elastic band and it took the screw straight out so that's the first thing we're going to try because that is always the easiest thing to try so I put the elastic band over the screw it is better if you have a bit of a wider elastic band than what we've got here but it should still work so I'm going to press that down I've got drill in reverse I'm now going to apply pressure and squeeze the trigger and you can see that the elastic band just enabled us to grip that screw which has enabled us to get it out and if you look in there you will actually see there is a bit of the elastic band in there so that is always the first thing that I try because sometimes it does work it doesn't always work but sometimes it works and it can save you a lot of hassle trying to remove the screws the next thing you can try is an impact driver you need to ensure that you get a good quality bit in there and also I need to ensure that it is in the correct direction because you don't want to tighten it up to use one of these simply put it into the damage screw and then hit it on the top with a good quality hammer and I do think that that has loosened that so there's a chance now that we will be able to get it using the drill and as you can see that loosened that enough so that we could get that out so an impact driver is very useful tool because the actual shock of you hitting it and try to move it in the correct direction often helps to remove a damaged screw if you look at that you can see that it is very badly damaged you can buy damaged screw removers like that and they often work on the screws like this and they are often worth a shot you can usually pick up for about 10 to 15 pounds so I've just fixed that in the chuck I'm going to ensure the drill is in Reverse and then choose one of these you need to press down hard and slowly press on the trigger and eventually that will bite and hopefully undo the screw you can see that bit in there very quickly enabling it to be removed very easily we've then got the grab it the grab it by a trend is a very good quality remover this actually works very well and I've actually used this on some wood screws and it's even worked on those as well so this does work extremely well we've actually got two of those in this kit and they do a superb job of removing damaged screws to use this you use that end first in Reverse or an anti-clockwise direction and that will remove some of the material from the screw you then turn it over and that bit will actually bite into the screw and remove it in reverse sometimes when you're using this that part actually grips so well when it's cutting that it actually removes the screw and brings it out so we'll now try this I've got the drill in reverse I'm pressing down hard on it and as you can see that brought the screw straight out and there's no chance at all of that screwdriver bit gripping any of these there are completely rounded off on the inside you can use a centre punch and a hammer or you can use a centre punch like this which is spring-loaded these are very useful for jobs like this and you can use these in confined spaces so to use this you need to get it on the edge of the screw pull back on it and then the momentum from the spring will force the hammer forwards and undo the screw you can see that once we've got that loose we can then grab that with our fingers and remove it as you can see there's no chance at all of removing that using the screwdriver but by using something like that you can actually loosen it enough so as you can grab it with your fingers or with a pair of mole grips if you can get hold of them you can use left handed drill bits these are designed to be used in Reverse so all we need to do is choose one that's a little bit smaller than the actual head on the screw then put that in the drill and then we'll ensure that the drill is in Reverse well apply it firm pressure to that this will start to drill the screw but once it bites there is a very good chance that it will actually remove the screw like so so that's another thing that you can use to remove a damaged screw another thing you can try is cutting a slot in it using an angle grinder or a dremel but you do have to be careful of damaging the surrounding material another thing you can use is a cold chisel and a hammer and you can often just knock that around enough so that it's loose and then again we can grab that with my fingers so hopefully this video will have shown you some techniques that you can use to remove screws with a damaged head I just like to point out that if you try to remove a wood screw which is four inches long like that and the head has been damaged you have got virtually no chance at all of doing that in most cases if you do try and remove it you're just gonna snap the head off the screw but when you're doing jobs like removing Euro cylinders form uPVC doors etc or if somebody's made a mess of a screw using the incorrect screw driver these are some of the techniques that you can use I hope you've enjoyed watching this video if you are you haven't done so already please subscribe to the channel