is there anything wrong with using stock head bolts on a heads/cam motor? stock lower.

mike

 

I think I saw somewhere that the head bolts stretch when torqued down and thats why you need to use new ones. Either way do you really want to skimp on bolts? Maybe someone else can chime in on this.

 

The factory head bolts are designed to be used once... Some people have gotten away with reusng them, but it's not worth the risk. Get some new bolts

 

I reused mine with no problems

 

Cheap insurance to prevent a blown head gasket.

 

$50 bucks and you can get plan black arp head bolts.. its worth it.

 

on ls1's they are not to be reused, but lt1's its ok. the only thing i can find you have to replace on an lt1 is the connecting rod bolts because they are torque to yeild bolts.

 

LT1 head bolts are also TTY bolts...

 

All bolts with that amount of torque on them stretch (TTY or not). Why take a chance on something so important. IMO, never reuse head bolts (unless you just don't care).

 

I agree with shoebox. At least go get you a set of fel pros or something from advance auto. They are only like 30$

 

I wouldn't reuse the head bolts. There's a chance that you may snap one when you torque them down. I know from experience.

 

i've reused them many time on older engines, but those are cast iron with real torque settings. this stretch bolt thing is something else. i guess it's more precise for high hp app's but this is killing me.

because of financial issues i had decided to throw my motor together with stock internals 224/236 cam, p/p intake from squinn, and p/p heads done myself.
well the heads are alot of work, still not done, close but not done.
dished out $50 for rod bolts, tried to get one out and decided to have it done, that cost me $170, frigging rediculious. crank was fine, replaced cam bearings, mains and rods, busted a ring so i bought a new set, another $100, got raped on the cam bearings and they didn't even lube the journels, they began to rust! i had to pull it and clean off the rust. and i still have to get a valve job done after i cc the heads.

so i pulled the motor apart because it had 90k so i figured i'd freshen it up. well turns out it was just rebuilt before i bought it. only had 25k on it.
now a basic rebuild is costing me way too much, hell the motor was fine to begin with.

so yes, i do some some problems with dishing out $50 for a set of arp's but i'm not stupid, if they are tty then i'll replace them.

thanks for the replies.


mike

 

no , u cannot re-use head bolts, cannot re-use flywheel bolts either. get some arp's, you can re use the arp ones when u blow ur engine up after your cam install

 

Simple answer = no !

 

also, if ur worried about a 60$ set of head bolts,,i hope your not skimping on any other part of the engine cuz thats a bad idea !