Rusty Ultegra lever screw

My brake cables snapped and there is part of it stuck inside the lever. The bottom screw is too rusty to open…any ideas?

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Drill it out. Pliers. Cut a groove in it and try again. More force is always the answer.

soak it in some WD40 or other release penetrant first, give it a good spray and leave it overnight preferably. Is it an allen head or phillips? You could use a torx driver of a similar size and jam it in using the taper and it might move, worth trying that first before the destructive suggestions above

Dig the grot out of the screw head first of all so a screwdriver can properly bite into it. Get the correct size screwdriver and apply as much pressure as you can when turning. If you can, use a good quality screwdriver such as wera, which have abrasive tips to help grip. A fine lapping paste can also help grip if you don’t have wera/don’t want to spend out on wera screwdriver for one job.

Use a penetrating fluid but it might not do much as it’s probably screwed straight in to plastic.

Ideally replace it when you get it out with a clean screw or clean this one up and grease it to stop it corroding so badly in the future.

Is the screw JIS, if so use a JIS screw driver. Not any random Philips/pozi screw driver

My 2c is that after soaking in penetrant and ensuring you have the right bit, hammer it into place and carefully use a 1/4" rattlegun, or at least a cordless drill with a ball-indexed clutch on a light setting.

The impacts help heaps with this sort of stuff.