top end rattle, anyone run a B3 without the valve cover on?

[Larry Hampton]

I undid them with a 12mm on my 1/4" drive Craftsman ratchet.

It's an M8 fine thread I think. I'm taking one with me to O'Reilleys to see if they have one, if not, I've got the NAPA warehouse on the south edge of Edmond.

[Zanzer]

I think it's an M8 x 1.25 or 1.50. I can't remember the exact pitch, I just remember I didn't have the tap in all of my tap and die sets so I need to pick one up for chasing those holes when I rebuild heads.

[Larry Hampton]

It's M8 x 1.0, I found a kit on eBay for $39, comes with 6 inserts.

I only need 1, would anyone be interested in buying the remainder of the kit from me? I figure the inserts are $6.50 each, so the kit would be $32.50 shipped, use what you need and pass it on to the next guy for $6.50 per insert less than you used.

[FestYboy]

honestly, if there's one that has the threads pulled, there's likely to be more found when everything is reinstalled

[Zanzer]

^^ Yup. Because the same guy who cranked down on that one and stretched during the previous installation tightened all the others too

[Larry Hampton]

I've pulled all the others, they seemed fine. I loosened them with a 1/4 drive and retightened them to probably about spec. This was #5 in the sequence (assuming he tightened them in sequence).

I'm going to double check the torque on the head bolts or studs while they're accessible.

[iceracerdude]

...and retightened them to probably about spec...

This is exactly (not probably) the reason the other guy got into trouble
on the original job...zero attention to detail.
"how can we possibly fix the problem using the same idelogy that got us into trouble in the first place"?
The "missing bolt", Did you ever locate it? Is that getting tossed around the sound you were hearing?

P.S. I wouldn't put the sea foam in the crankcase oil, It may damage your crank and rod bearings. imo

[Larry Hampton]

Explicative you. You don't know me from Adam. Zanzer said 14-19 in/lbs, now I don't have an in/lbs torque wrench, but for as many years as I've been wrenching, I've never stripped a hole, and I know how much less forgiving aluminum is.

I've never used a torque wrench on a wheel. I've probably changed over 200 in my life. This is exactly the kind of post I would put up. It has no helpful information, all it does is criticize. What do you mean did I find the bolt?!? Can't you read? I already said I looked for it and can't find it. If its anywhere, its in the pan and likely won't become a problem. I've pulled engines apart before that had multiple pushrods and even a distributor drive in the pan and they ran fine.

Seafoam is meant to be put in the crankcase. People have done it, it cleans up the varnish inside the engine.

Congratulations on gaining absolutely no credibility with me.

[Zanzer]

I Those rails only torque to 14-19lbs (IIRC)

It's foot pounds, sorry I should have specified. A regular torque wrench will work if it goes down small enough but I think my 1/2" one starts at 25. I use a 3/8" torque wrench that starts at 5ft/lbs for the small stuff like this. Heck I even use it for the inch/pound stuff because my in/lb wrench starts at 250 (IIRC) and there's a lof of stuff on the B series that is around 95in/lb so I just set the 3/8" wrench for 8ft/lbs (95in/lbs divided by 12 {1 ft/lb} = 7.916ft/lbs).

Hopefully the other guy felt the bolt strip and just left it out. I had to do this on one a couple of weeks ago. Someone had cranked it down and when I went to put it back in I could feel the threads giving way so I just pulled it back out before I finished stripping it. I'm currently rebuilding a head for the car so I figured it was best to run it without for a while rather than take the chance of it making it's way to the oil pan. It should be ok if yours made it to the pan since the bolt has got some weight to it, but I have pulled some pans that had a VC gasket torque limiter laying in it and you could see where it had gotten knocked around some before it found a final resting place.


Also, I looked up the torque spec for the rocker rail shaft bolts for you because I don't wanna give out bad info. It's 16-21ft/lb (per the Mitchell manual) so I was pretty close on my guesstimate....yay me LOL

[Larry Hampton]

I probably shouldn't have gone off on iceracerdude, I was mowing in this freaking 100+ degree heat, but I still stand by the sentiment, he gave absolutely no information that helped the situation at all.

Zanzer, the missing bolt was the cam retainer bolt, but I still think it never got put in, the threads for it were fine. I have the bolt for the shaft, it was there.

[Zanzer]

I feel ya, it's been nasty here all week too. Ok, I remember it was the thrust plate bolt that was missing. At least all the other fasteners were there LOL

PS - Picked me up an M8 x 1.00 tap today. I was in Northern Tool and when I walked passed the taps I remembered your issue, which in turn made me remember that I didn't have this tap in any of my sets

Thanks for helping me remember that! :thumbright:

[TDI_ftw]

It's M8 x 1.0,

I can confirm this, as I did the same thing a week ago.

[iceracerdude]

I probably shouldn't have gone off on iceracerdude, I was mowing in this freaking 100+ degree heat, but I still stand by the sentiment, he gave absolutely no information that helped the situation at all.

Zanzer, the missing bolt was the cam retainer bolt, but I still think it never got put in, the threads for it were fine. I have the bolt for the shaft, it was there.

What are you talking about, me specifing the use of a torque wrench as being critical to assembly procedures is meant to stop you from having future problems. Not just stripped threads, but the equal torquing (as well as loosening) of these components in an effort to stop the bending of these parts. I was going to even suggest taking the parts in for a machine shop to dial gauge them for run out at this point, but you seemed like you just wouldn't have that! I know you've got experience, but so do I, I've got a nissan engine with a redline of 7,500 that the procedures for what you're doing are SO critical it's done in 6 steps! Just tryin to help you and everone else's engines run like mine, sorry for the misunderstanding.

[Larry Hampton]

Well, if you would have read what I wrote, I loosened the rocker shaft retainer bolts, after finding the culprit, I went back and retightened the bolts with a 1/4" ratchet, its maybe 5" long. What kinda torque can I get on that? I did it to check the integrity of the threads. I tightened them no more than they were originally tightened I know for sure. And you're saying at that point I should have used a torque wrench? There was no assembly. And this is a plain ol B3, I got the car for mileage, not for redline blasts. I don't want it to run like yours, I have other vehicles for spirited driving. Runout I can check for on a piece of glass, to see if further investigation is warrented, if nothing else, I'll pull a pair from an Aspire at PAP.

The shafts are both removed as I have yet to check to make sure they're in the right order. Plus they hoth had to be removed in order to repair the stripped hole.

My initial posts to respond to someone's delima tend to either ask questions that weren't answered in the OP's request, and this is after several times of reading it and any other posts that follow. For instance, there was a question about hub centric vs lug centric wheels on these cars. People are putting lug centric wheels on them with the stock lug nuts, people were even encouraging it. That is not a safe application due to the design and engineering for hub centric. I said so, but I don't know if my advice was heeded.

I'm waiting on figuring out where i'll acquire a thread repair kit, but I have more urgent projects, one being the clutch kit I'm putting in my other car, and then repairing a blown head gasket in my daughters '00 4.0 Explorer that I'm not looking forward to. I'm worried that the heads are warped and possibly cracked although I see no milkshake. The leak is out the back corner of the passenger side head.

So for now, this is on the.back burner. Yes, its an easier fix and daughter could attempt to drive it, but she just cannot get the clutch down, I tried to teach her in my Amigo, which is a heck of a lot easier than my '65 Mustang.

[Larry Hampton]

I can confirm this, as I did the same thing a week ago.

What did you do? Buy a kit? The local fasteners supply house carries Timeserts.