Rocker bolt- hole stripped?

[IslanderOffRoad]

I’m in the middle of a tupy swap on my 01 xj. Head is a rebuilt from Windy City cylinder heads

Finally got the head on and torqued down today, then started installing the pushrods and rockers

Had an issue with one of the bolts for the rockers. Followed the fsm procedure of alternating back and forth to avoid bending the bridge, and one went from righty tighty to righty loosey

Pulled it back apart and a bunch of threads came out with the bolt. Didn’t appear or feel like it had cross threaded.

Reached out to Windy City and they said:

Sorry you have an issue. I’m not sure why, we do retap all the bolt holes.
The only thing I can suggest would be to install a helicoil in that hole.

Anyone here has a similar issue? How did you resolve it. I really don’t want to pull the head again if I don’t have to.

[RCP Phx]

A Heli-coil is about your only solution besides not torqueing the bolts down under a load. You should be "indexing" the cam for each stud.

[IslanderOffRoad]

Originally Posted by RCP Phx

A Heli-coil is about your only solution besides not torqueing the bolts down under a load. You should be "indexing" the cam for each stud.

I followed the procedure in the fsm. No mention of indexing the cam...

[IslanderOffRoad]

Before drilling it out I suppose I should see if it makes a difference if I rotate it to tdc since this is cylinder 1. Wonder if it would bite at that point

[RCP Phx]

Originally Posted by IslanderOffRoad

I followed the procedure in the fsm. No mention of indexing the cam...

I think that it comes under the category of general common knowledge.

Originally Posted by IslanderOffRoad

Before drilling it out I suppose I should see if it makes a difference if I rotate it to tdc since this is cylinder 1. Wonder if it would bite at that point

That's pretty risky.

That's why I changed to studs at my earliest convenience.

[Tim_MN]

Install at least one Heli-Coil and consider doing them all. The aluminum and magnesium military parts we make at work all get Heli-Coils as specified on the blueprint.

[IslanderOffRoad]

Originally Posted by RCP Phx

I think that it comes under the category of general common knowledge.

Gonna disagree with you there but now I know for once I make the repair

[IslanderOffRoad]

Originally Posted by Tim_MN

Install at least one Heli-Coil and consider doing them all. The aluminum and magnesium military parts we make at work all get Heli-Coils as specified on the blueprint.

Any particular reason for doing them all? Had 0 issues on the other cylinders

[Tim_MN]

How do you know for sure that they didn't mess up any of the other threads ?

[Black1990jeep]

Timeserts are my preferred thread repair method over helicoil.

http://www.timesert.com/

good luck

[IslanderOffRoad]

Originally Posted by Tim_MN

How do you know for sure that they didn't mess up any of the other threads ?

Because they installed with no issue

[IslanderOffRoad]

Originally Posted by Black1990jeep

Timeserts are my preferred thread repair method over helicoil.

http://www.timesert.com/

good luck

I was looking at those but I’m not sure there’s enough of a shoulder on the tower to counter sink

[RCP Phx]

Case savers or time-certs work great in aluminum, but heli-coils work great in cast iron/steel.

[IslanderOffRoad]

Got it all together. Helicoil worked and was pretty easy to accomplish. Jeep idles and runs great