Major freak out / exhaust manifold

[James Morse]

So.... I'm checking oil, trans fluid, etc. Did I look at engine before I bought it, sure, didn't see anything obvious on a quick glance, but I remember I did think to myself, seems like I might be hearing a whisper of an exhaust manifold leak on the left I said to myself, it's barely noticeable, and, you can replace gasket there, not fun, but it's do-able. Check this out:

Holy crap Batman. WTF. OK, so I was an idiot to not see it. I've hit a few pretty good potholes and it's still there, someone put it on real tight, so it's "working" but, holy moses. I suspect they broke off the bolt or stripped the threads and said, f it, this'll work. And it does, but, wow. What I didn't know wasn't hurting me, but, sooner or later these may well come off, then, I'll probably have a pretty loud leak, and let's face it this is fubar beyone fubar. Short term I'm not touching it, but, what do I do to set things right? It's not that easy to get to it. If bolt is broken off in the block then I'd have to drill it, try to easy-out it, etc, probably very hard to do. If threads stripped, I suppose there are helical inserts but you have to tap it out probably. Honestly I've never faced something like this so I really don't know wtf I'm talking about how to fix it correctly. I suppose they could have just lost the bolt, that would be the ideal situation, but I'm afraid to take the thing off to see if that's the issue, because it's holding and I just don't want to touch it..... I can see bright silver of a new manifold gasket, I bet this happened when they were changing it out. What happens if vise grips fall off, will it wreck something else or just be loud and not correct back pressure..... HELP! please

 

[fastpakr]

I'm a little confused by what the vice grips are clamping together?

 

[James Morse]

They're holding the exhaust manifold to the block as far as I can tell. You have the manifold, and the block, and the silver gasket in between. It's hard to see in the pic. The jaws of the vise grips are covering the hole where the bolt would go in. I had to look at it a couple times. I mean, I am pretty sure that's what's going on. At first I thought, oh, someone left a pair of vise grips in there, but, they're on real tight, which you can do with vise grips. It sure as heck aint right though.

I guess the other manifold bolts are there... so probably it wouldn't fall off.... but... wow. Hope that helps.

 

[fastpakr]

Are they just keeping the bolt from falling out? Because from the picture it doesn't look like the jaws actually go to the block itself.

 

[James Morse]

There's no bolt. But here's the thing --- I looked at the other bolts, and it looks to me that, rather than a bolt going into the block, the way it's put together is a bolt with a NUT on it lower side, and if that's true, then all I need to do, I think, is get the right bolt and washer and nut - which I'd think would be easy - and put it on. I guess they just lost it and didn't bother getting another one. People are weird. Or the flange could be broken. Anyway, it's not the same as what I wrote about (bolt only). I thought the exh manifold bolts went into the block and I was mistaken about that. So maybe this isn't the huge deal that I thought it was.

And of course I was wondering how the vise grips were staying on, because, if in fact there was just a bolt into the block, then there probably wouldn't have been a flange to put the vise grips on.

Am I making sense?

When I said "block" what I meant was whatever the exh manifold attaches to. I'd assume that would be the block, but I'm no expert on this stuff, 99% of my knowledge, such as it is, came from hard knocks and fixing stuff as it broke, and I've never had anything remotely like this truck. I drove Saabs from early 70's until a year ago, had a ton of them. Raced a Fiesta in SCCA ITC a couple years, and had a big Chevy wagon back when, that's about it. I have to say though I am loving this truck. Fantastic visibility, easy ingress/egress, can carry all kinds of stuff that I was always cramming into other cars, can throw lawn chairs, fishing gear, coolers in the back, easier to work on, parts are available, so many advantages. I was going to get a sports car and man am I glad I didn't. I love cruising in the truck and I don't mind little fixes here there that are not stopping it from running, and even if I had to do something major, I probably would. Used vehicles are really high these days and I was lucky to find something I could afford and I got no buyer regrets at all and truck has zero rust. Some scratches and dents, I don't care, they can always be fixed, paint is generally real good. I shouldn't say too much I suppose because just when you think things are great is usually when something goes south, heh.

 

[19Walt93]

They're holding the manifold to the head, the exhaust doesn't come out of the block. The bolts are supposed to thread into the head but someone apparently bolt and nutted it instead of rethreading the hole after breaking off a bolt. If the nut will contact the head in a flat place, a bolt and nut will work.

 

[James Morse]

Thanks 19Walt93. Sorry, head. Yeah. WTF wrong with me.

Ah. All the ones on the left, at least, are bolt PLUS nut so looks like that was the go-to fix and I guess it works. In fact it makes you wonder why even have threads in the head when you can do this which is much easier and don't have to worry about stripped threads. I don't see it would make a difference either way, all it has to do is hold the parts tightly together.

Would you suggest, then, that I should simply find the right size bolt and washer(s) and nut and take off the vise grips and put the bolt/nut on there? I can't see why that wouldn't work, it seems to be working for the other ones.

 

[fastpakr]

Head, yes, not block.

But I'm still struggling with the visual about how this is working...

 

[James Morse]

OK, I don't think pic is going to help because it's really hard to see. Diagram of it probably will help which I will try to find. Meanwhile.... as far as I can tell, there are multiple bolts for each exh port. It -looks- like the lower ones go directly into the head. The upper ones go into a flange that sticks out from the head, that's why they could get the vise grips on there. As I looked at the other ones and both sides of the engine, I see that in fact what is going on, I think, for the upper bolts, is that mostly they aren't bolts, they are threaded rod, or, a headless bolt, or whatever you want to call it. So when you would take off the headers, you would take the nut off (at least for the upper) and the threaded rod would remain in the flange on the head. So, say you broke that, you could drill it out if the threads were still good you could just put another threaded rode/headless bolt in there using jam nut process, if you follow.

But if the threads were shot or you were an idiot then you could just put a headed bolt through there because nothing is in the way of doing that. It's not correct, but it would, I think, work fine.

The lower bolt or bolts that attach the headers or exhast manifold to the head do indeed go directly into the head so you would not have the option of kluging it.

Hope that helps and sorry if I am still getting terminology wrong.

Oh and I found that I think it is missing one also on the right rear. That stuff definitely should be set right one way or the other, it'll stress the other bolts to not have all of them on there.

This site shows pic of the exhaust, I think it's the same as mine, so you can see there are upper and lower bolts and it's the upper I'm talking about. Could be missing some on the bottom too (they go directly into the head, I think, unlike the tops). I guess there are enough to hold them on but clearly it needs some work. Uppers you can use bolt with nut if the headless bolt is broken or threads stripped. Bottom ones you'd have an issue and couldn't do that, at least based on what I'm seeing. Kind of just feeling it out as I go.

https://www.carparts.com/details/Fo...VkgiICR0MwQ4REAQYASABEgLy3fD_BwE&gclsrc=aw.ds

If I have to do much work on it, maybe it would make sense to get decent headers for it if they are a bolt-up. Or not. Stock is fine, but if I gained a bit in power it might be nice to do.

Here is pic of head, you can see the bolt pattern that matches up to the exhaust manifold or header or whatever it's called. I assume my engine is OEM but who knows. It's a V6, anyway.

 

[cbxer55]

That's a very bodge fix there. Something I've always been good at. Old Wile E. Coyote would be proud!

3.0 or 4.0?

 

[Dirtman]

But I'm still struggling with the visual about how this is working...

It's best not to think about it...

 

[James Morse]

Ha-Ha to both... yeah... it's running, guess I wait until it sh*ts the bed huh. Must've been like, hey man, are you using those vise grips? I need them. Never in my life seen such a thing. Well, if I ever get it fixed, I'll get a nice pair of brand name vise grips out of it, lol.

 

[Dirtman]

Ha-Ha to both... yeah... it's running, guess I wait until it sh*ts the bed huh. Must've been like, hey man, are you using those vise grips? I need them. Never in my life seen such a thing. Well, if I ever get it fixed, I'll get a nice pair of brand name vise grips out of it, lol.

My old van had vice grips for door handles for about 10 years.

Ya gotta do what ya gotta do.

 

[cbxer55]

Ha-Ha to both... yeah... it's running, guess I wait until it sh*ts the bed huh. Must've been like, hey man, are you using those vise grips? I need them. Never in my life seen such a thing. Well, if I ever get it fixed, I'll get a nice pair of brand name vise grips out of it, lol.

They look a tad rusty though. And the heat may have affected the heat treat of the metal. When you remove them, they might just fall apart. LOL!

 

[pjtoledo]

Dorman 03427 is a bolt kit to show you what should be in there. the studs with nuts are special 1 piece bolts.
the extra studs are to attach support brackets and the oil dipstick tube.