Well I was rocking and rolling along, making great time taking off my factory exhaust manifolds, y-pipe, and EGR/AIR system to install my Pacesetter headers, y-pipe, cutout, and polyurethane motor mounts.

And then it happened. I was backing the next to last rear bolt out of the driver side. Something went wrong with my air wrench, it stuck on and continued backing the bolt out after I let go of the trigger. I couldn't get the air hose off fast enough. It backed the wrench right up to the steering shaft and torquing the header bolt. The bolt was still about 10% in the hole but visibly torqued at an angle. It was so tight that I ended up having to cut the socket in half because the wrench was stuck.

Once I got everything apart I tried to hand thread another bolt back in it and it didn't go so well. It appears that about the first 10% of the hole is stripped out. Possibly more but I didn't force it. When the bolt was still in it appeared to be mostly out.

Do y'all think there is any chance I can get a tap and make this hole usable?

Has anyone done this with success?

Will it just be a waste of time to try to tap it?

I know this is an opportunity to put better heads on but I can NOT afford to pull the heads for machining or buy new ones.

 

I feel your pain - I had a similiar thing happen to me when I was replacing the head gaskets on my dad's V6. If its not too bad, you should be able to tap it. When I stripped the hole, it was pretty bad but luckily I have a friend who works at a machine shop tap it for me because I've never done anything like that before. So, you should be able to fix it if its not terrible.

 

It's easy to tap those holes. I believe it's a M8/1.25. Just take one of your other header bolts to the hardware store to match up the size, and buy a tap for it.

 

I hope so. Thanks for the tap size. I will double check it to be sure but it's nice to have an idea of what size I need.

I've done this before on iron heads but not aluminum. I was just worried that it might be useless.

I had actually just convinced my wife to let me buy a set of 5.3s if these aren't fixable. Then she read your post Damian.














I'm kidding. She really did say that but I'd much rather just get my car together now than have to wait and do a head swap. Thanks for the advice.

 

I would try retapping it first, borrow one from work or a friend.

If that doesnt work, an EZ-lock is by far the best option:

 

I tapped mine. Had to do 2 of them from the jackass previous owner. I made my own tap, it worked great.

 

I mangled one of my holes up a little bit and they have a a set of thread chasers you can rent at Autozone I used it and it worked perfectly.

 

Can anyone spot the problem with my brand new fresh out of the box tap?

I put it in about a half turn by hand and then gently started turning it to tap the stripped threads. I got it in about 2 turns, backed it out to check progress, and found that part of it had broken off inside the head.

I was going very slow and very gently and never felt anything stick and never had to torque anything so I have no idea what happened.

The good news is that it did fix the stripped threads and the headers bolts will now thread (apparently the damage was only the outside couple of threads), the bad news is there is now a piece of the tap stuck in my head.

I'm not sure what else could go wrong, but I'm sure I'll find out as soon as I go back to working on it.

 

The tap isn't shiney. No signs of oil in your pic at all. You did liberally oil the tap and the threads didn't you?

 

Yes I did. It's shinier in my other picture. But the picture didn't come out well. This one was taken after I wiped it down, cleaned it off, and took it inside to photograph. Greasy tools and car parts are frowned upon inside.

 

sorry to hear that.

i too had a bolt strip in my driver side head when installing my ARHs 2 weeks ago. i was able to chase the hole, and found the first two or three threads to be bad.

as for your broken tap, have you tried a magnet? if you can find one small enough, you should be able to insert it into the hole and then slowly unscrew it.

tony

 

I used a helicoil to fix mine and been there for three years now and never came out, and Ive also have removed the headers several times on alimunum heads. I got it at Advance Auto