KuHL 951

Agreed, starting at the corners can build residual stress as you work towards the center. At 15 ft-lbs it's probably not critical but still standard practice to radiate from the center. The tightening sequence shown above isn't in any manuals I've seen. The balance shaft covers are the only bolts with a goofy pattern for tightening because of the bearing bridge locations.

75ohm

Hang tight guys... no pun intended... I fessed up to being wrong here... give me chance to correct it before we get too far in the weeds. I was too quick to use an incorrect example in illustrating not going from left to right/right to left on the lower bolts. I'm working up the a more appropriate diagram and will post it separately as to not discard both yours and Iceman's comments. Thanks.

75ohm

Steve, and for the record, I completely agree with any loaded application -- best practice is to perform at any time, as you've both stated.

Of which we should consider a request for change at Clark's:

"Install the cam housing bolts (M8). A small amount of grease in the head of the Allen bolt or on the tip of the Allen head socket will hold the bolt on the socket while installing inside the cam housing. Remember to install the coolant return pipe when installing the cam housing bolts. There is no specified tightening sequence for the cam housing bolts. However, they should be tightened so that the cam housing is pulled down evenly onto the alignment pins. Once the housing is fully seated on the head, torque the cam housing bolts to 20 Nm (14 ft-lbs). "

choinga

thanks guys - I'm going to print this thread out and take it to my mechanic. I'm sure (when they do this job correctly) they have some rhyme or reason to how the tighten the bolts down...but I like what I'm reading here.

I'd just do it myself and see if it still leaks, but I'd rather get them to fix what they messed up (or didn't finish) and as mentioned, I think any decent mechanic would agree that once you've got a gasket with some leakage the right thing to do is replace it not crank it down some more.

75ohm

To preserve the thread integrity and with respect to the posts by Iceman and Kuhl 951, we have a more preferred order for cam tower bolt sequencing:

KuHL 951

LOL Sorry ,not being critical, we just type too fast and are bored Again, at 15ft-lb it's probably a moot point anyway. I would be concerned about an oil soaked paper gasket though. I had a BMW HG leak that was brand new and I didn't re-torque it after warm-up, it still had a slight leak after re-torque. That sucker never sealed again until I replaced it two weeks later. Oil just seems to find it's own path sometimes.

75ohm

Hoping the shop takes care of this for choinga...

schwank

FWIW, you can easily make a good tool for this job... and it works well in many other places too.

Go buy a 1/4" drive deep well 6mm socket and a 6mm hex key. Cut the hex key down to a couple inches or so, and then JB Weld/epoxy it into the deep well socket. You want a reasonably short piece of hex key so that it does not twist when you apply torque.

I have used mine for 3 years... and it gets a lot of use on various cars. Has held up great and is one of my most invaluable tools.

choinga

Thanks again guys - I talked to the shop owner today...he definitely agreed that this wasn't right. I already had some time on the books for next monday with them to get a new bung tig welded into my exhaust so I can get my wideband installed. I think what we're going to do is replace the cork gasket and then just torque down the cam and watch it real close to see if it leaks. I'm going to replace my oil pressure sender which ironically died the same day apparently and hopefully we're good to go. If we're still leaking he said he'd replace the gasket on the cam tower. I'll update after I get out of there monday...

Wipeout

Glad to hear they're going to help make it right for you.