[s-cars] Re: Valve Job Anyone?

[Mihnea Cotet]

Heck, I'll throw my 0.02 Euros in here too then :-) and don't forget that 
right now 2 Eurocents is worth more than 2 murkin' cents :-))))

I am fully with Scott on this one. ARP studs are useful if you're having 
permanent head gasket issues, i.e. you have to swap the head gasket every 
few months, even once a year. AFAIK and IME, this has never been a problem 
for anyone running a 20vt engine, unless that person would have used the 
stock, NLA paper head gasket every time.

So, really, what's the advantage in having studs over stock stretch bolts 
in a high performance engine? If the bolts are torqued properly, they will 
never be a problem by themselves. ARP studs are more expensive (I think 3 
times more expensive but I might be wrong) than stock bolts and if you 
don't replace at least 3 head gaskets over the lifetime of your engine, 
they aren't worth the expense. So if it's a matter of having "ARP head 
studs" written in an extensive signature line describing all mods, then I 
agree, it's "better" to have ARP studs than stock stretch bolts.

Now if you're having head gasket issues on a 20vt motor, the problem is 
elsewhere and it has to be found and solved and ARP studs won't be an 
advantage at all over the stock bolts.


Mihnea, bolting heads up in Belgium and not knowing nuttin' 'bout dynos and 
studs, C.

At 16:13 15/01/2004 -0500, QSHIPQ at aol.com wrote:
>Until I see more than another testimonial, I'm not sure Mike's summation 
>isn't more accurate.  Hap, couldn't it very well be that the head 
>bolts/gasket were the victim, not the other way around?
>
>As I asked ARP, I need more information.  As you don't routinely wrench on 
>your own machines Hap, I'm not sure that calling a kettle black is 
>applicable yet.  IME, the head bolts are rarely (if ever) a cause for 
>concern in a 20vt motor.  As you haven't quite sorted out your on boost 
>issues, I'm hardly convinced that you have a head bolt 
>problem.  Yet.  I'll also say that when I experience blown headgaskets in 
>my shop, never has it been because of head bolts.
>
>Are we speaking of head gasket/bolts AS the failure, or the result of a 
>failure?  Did you measure excessive stretch on the stock head bolts.  What 
>IS excessive stretch? I'll also say that the MTM/SMS grpA S2 used stock 
>twisted head bolts from das faterland.  With it's Hapersized turbo and 
>26+psi boost in all out racing conditions 100% of it's service life, we 
>never blew a head gasket (we did spin a conrod tho).   My own conclusion 
>to date is, if replacing new twisted head bolts with ARP studs caused 
>"less failure", you still have the problem you did before.
>
>YMMVHW (your mileage may vary in haperworld)
>I don't know nuttin, still don't
>
>Scott Justusson
>QSHIPQ Performance Tuning
>
>
>
>
>In a message dated 1/15/2004 11:09:22 AM Eastern Standard Time, CaptMagu 
>writes:
>
> > Scott
> >
> > In my humble opinion, I don't think you know what you're talking about. 
> I have personally been the victim of stretched head bolts and will always 
> use ARP products whenever I can.
> > HTH.
> >
> > Hap,
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