So I've been fighting one of the AC bracket bolts that doubles as a header bolt ever since putting this engine in. The top of the hole threads in the head are a bit compromised so I've been very leery of cranking too much torque into the bolt...and it kept coming loose. The last time I tightened it...it sort of felt like it was pulling what was left of the threads out so I just stopped and left it. Yesterday the bolt and spacer left the car as I was traveling down the highway...so now I HAD to fix is.
I picked up a 6" stud and some metal pipe for a spacer and got busy. The stud threaded all the way in, hit bottom and snugged up real well with a double nut on the other end. So I marked the stud to show when it's all the way in, cut the spacer, cut the stud to length and put a groove in the end of it so I could run it in with a screwdriver. Dab of high temp RTV in the hole to fill in any voids then ran the stud in until it hit bottom. It snugged up real nice and it felt REAL good to me to really reef on the nut while holding a screwdriver in the stud and it didn't budge. It's tight now...hopefully the last time I have to deal with this.
So I set out to do some parking lot testing of all the new stuff. This car is now OMG fun on corner exit!! It had me laughing out loud to myself!! That's what it's all about right?
Bring on Test n Tune and event 1 next weekend...I'm ready.