Got everything out and off... How do I get these tiny star bolts out? Where do I even find such a tool?!?

I'm doing hte Autozone rebuild kit....

Damn I wish I had more time... I'm just looking at my stock cam dreaming of ripping that sucker out.

 

do a couple of searches on here and you will see that most of the time the rebuild doesnt work.

Its your money.

But I would just suggest replacing it with a new one. GM parts direct has a good price. And Sam taylor is suppost to be even better. So do a search and you'll see what I mean.

Mike

 

The "tiny star bolts" are E4 Torx. You can use one of the T15 screws out of the throttle body cover plate for a socket.

 

haha...thats what i did after i couldnt get them out with my needle nose...chuck the bolt in a drill, backwards of course, ive found that works best.

 

I take one and double nut it, then use a socket on that [that way the threads don't get marred up.. remember the TB is aluminum..]

 

IS that the trick... The TB cover holds the key! haha... I went half way around the world with no luck...

anyhow... I drilled the old bolts out and removed the cover... Things were burnt up pretty bad inside the opti.. both cap and rotor are pretty much shot... on another note why wouldn't the Rebuld kit work? It's the same as any other cap and rotor kit... it would only not work if you put it together wrong, or you have a failure within the "opti" portion of the distributer itself.

 

If your opti has a lot of miles, it's just more cost efficient to replace the whole thing. The cost of a complete new opti is not much more than a cap and rotor (closer with the vented opti). The cap and rotor is not the only thing that goes out. The drive bearing can begin to go and dust the optical section to where it cannot "see". If any opti trouble codes were showing up, no cap or rotor is going to correct that problem.

 

The rebuild kit I got from AZ was pretty solid and looks well constructed... since it's all I needed for my opti I'm satisfied. But I wouldn't knock the rebuild kit before I tried one... if you need more than a cap and rotor... then that's a different story...but under time & budget you gotta do what you can to get things going.

THanks for the Bit tip Injuneer... whoda figure... the TB had the answer... I've been trying to track down this non exsistant torx bit all day. Ha.. hell I could of had the car back on the ground and at the track!

 

You should forget about going to the track and save your money to buy a new opti. I've read on here 100 of times where people buy the cap and rotor and the opti still causes problems. Then you have to go waste even more cash to get a new opti. A new opti is always cheaper then Rebuild kit+New opti later.

 

That's because those guys had more than Cap and rotor issues