How does that happen? I thought they only went into the coolant passages?

 

Which head bolts?

 

you sure it's coming from them and not dripping on them? only way you could have oil coming from a head bolt is oil getting into the coolant and then have a leaking head bolt too, 2 imdependent events

 

Right; all 34 go DIRECTLY into the water jacket. It is not possible for oil to come out of them unless you filled your cooling system with oil. (don't laugh... it's been done before.... OK, go ahead and laugh now....)

What type of sealer did you put on their threads?

 

I used white teflon thread sealant last time. Maybe I didn't use enough or something is cracked? Block or head damage? The valve cover was still tight and the gasket was good.

It just looked like the oil was oosing from the bolts. Quite a bit too. I've never heard of anything like this before.

 

oops, they were the bottom row, short bolts that were leaking.

W/ ARP hardware do you guys run the motor and then retorque the heads? Or tq them once when assembling them and go w/ it?

 

I just build it and drive it. I can't remember the last time I re-torqued a head.

New cars don't need it; correctly rebuilt ones shouldn't either.

 

i asked that ? once about re-torquing head bolts after a break-in and got a unanimous NO. if you retorque, it'll disturb the thread sealer, and if properly torqued, shouldn't need re-torque. so i left mine alone cuz i know i torqued them right, but i had a leak before that i'll have to check later - when it's running again...

 

What do you tq al. heads to? 65 ft lbs?

 

I'd check with the head manufacturer... you could look up the torque specs on a late '80s Corvette as well though, they had aluminum heads.

 

Sure it wasn't oil under the head bolts from when you adjusted rockers? Leaking valve cover? Could just be oozing if solvent wasn't used to blow off the residue. Hopefully it will not continue to oozze.

 

All GM aluminum heads that I've dealt with (pre-LS1) require 65ft-lbs, applied in 3 equal stages. I do 22-44-65 personally, though you don't have to be that exact with things (i.e. 20-45-65 will work fine as well, as long as they are 3 fairly equal steps)