Are headstuds REALLY that nessisary?

V

V8 HUNTER

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I know I know this topic has been beaten to death but I'm looking for some opinions..
On my truck I have a bw box 66mm with a 91 exhaust housing. Full cuts, ddp 140s, 0 plate, and timing bumped (not sure how much). This summer I'll be hooking my truck to a sled as much as possible as well as dding it.

I know some ppl on this forum thing that head studs are a waste of money. And I was doing some math and I could actually blow my head gasket 4 time and replace with stock parts berfore paying the same amount as Arp headstuds.
What about stock studs and orings on a stock head gasket?
What do you guys think about all this?
 
He's trying to tell you to do it once and spend time on other "nessisary" things.

Just a hit, don't mouth a vet. It won't get you anywhere


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I wasn't mouthing anyone It was just a joke. I guess it's hard to tell just by reading someone's words. :bang sorry If I offended anyone..

I know most people will say get headstuds (my 24v has them with a fire ringed head), but it I'm most interested in the others that say they're a rip off.
 
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no offended. I know you're just having fun :)

I've never heard any reasonable argument that studs are a rip off...

I say when in doubt, stud it and enjoy
 
V8 HUNTER said:
I wasn't mouthing anyone It was just a joke. I guess it's hard to tell just by reading someone's words. :bang sorry If I offended anyone..

I know most people will say get headstuds (my 24v has them with a fire ringed head), but it I'm most interested in the others that say they're a rip off.
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My bad man. I jumped the gun and assumed. If you don't wanna pay for arp studs you could always try Allen head bolts. There are many trucks running them around here on 60+ psi series and they are holding just fine.

http://www.mightydiesel.com/store/index.php?cPath=108



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I almost ran those on my other truck. Boost isn't really what I'm worried about. It's cylinder pressures from high loads, high timing and high drive pressure that scares me. My 24v blew its hg when I was racing a wrx on the freeway. I don't think I was the 50 psi from the stock charger that killed it.. Well not directly.. More like the insane drive pressures it was probably seeing. :charger:
 
I wanted some more opinions on stock bolts with orings.. I doubt that will happen at 1:30 in the morning lol
 
Honestly, from just my 'personal experience' I didn't notice that the arp 2000 did any better clamping than new Cummins head bolts. I had HG failures with both until ARP stepped up and sent me a set of the New Age 625 studs. Wow, now their good! You can tell a Huge diff. in the way they torque down. They come to torque right quick, and I never had another HG failure with hundreds of passes, sometimes running over 100# boost from a single stage turbo. Not saying you need these, their high as giraffe ***** but they flat work and are the best thing out there that I know of.
 
If your going to buy a set of allen bolts then just use your stock head bolts.
 
I ran the allen bolts for a year with good luck. They saw many passes at 90psi and low-mid 20s timing, 30 degrees of timing finally took out the head gasket. But, I think it was the 135lbs of torque on them that made the difference. Some are going that high or higher with the stock bolts, and are having the same luck though. I suspect the regular studs, bolts, or allen bolts will give similar results at similar torque.

After the head gasket went, I went with Extreme studs. Big difference in the way they feel when torqued. They come up quick, and there's no feeling of flex at all. Going to 150lbs is no problem with them. Plus, they have fine threads on the nut, so you get more clamping force per lbs of torque than with the coarse thread. With these I feel like I have a much better chance of the head gasket lasting, than with the bolts or cheaper studs. So far, I have over a hundred passes over the last year and a half on the same head gasket. I would expect the 625s, or the higher tool grade studs to give similar results.
 
Since you are going to dd it I would at least recommend o-rings. I would always let it reach operating temperature until, you beat on it. ALWAYS!! For the money you can't beat extreme studs that is what I plan to go with for my engine build. That looser exhaust housing on your 66 will help with drive pressure but if you are running more than say 23* of timing I wouldn't expect it to live forever..
 
The Hex Bolts work Great!
 
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If it were me, and this is what I planned on doing if I was to ever pull my 24 valve again, which maybe this summer or the next. I would torque the stock head bolts as far as I dare. With hopes of making a whole season on them, or close to a whole season. In the mean time I'd have a set of studs on the bench ready to go in. Once the head gasket blew I'd do o-rings and new gasket. One and done.
 
I ran close to the same setup you are running and had my stock bolts torqued to 150ft/lbs and blew the gasket within a year. I was just daily driving it at the time and beating on it quite frequently. I would recommend installing a quality stud and at least o rings.
 
It's no fun when one breaks off in the block and you can't get it out.
 
I haven't blown a head gasket yet. Although I did pull the head and 0-ring the block last spring. 75psi so far with stock bolts and o-rings.

65psi, a hit of nitrous, 26* timing and a lot of rpm was about as hard as I pushed it with just stock bolts torqued to 140 without o-rings.
 
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