"Tighten it until it strips, then back off 1/4 turn!" One of my competitors on the round track called me one night and asked if I could install some heli-coils in the race engine he was building. It turns out he had stripped about 1/3 of the head bolts on a 350 Chevy while assembling it, after consuming about a case and a half of beer. He had about a 20% error in the calibration of the torque wrench he had borrowed. I asked him why he didn't stop when the first one stripped instead of continuing to bolt the heads on. "I was in a hurry to get the job done!"
I ended up installing heli-coils in EVERY head bolt hole on both sides of the block! The car never made it to the race track- - - -he was road-testing it on the dead end street where he lived, lost his brakes, and ended up crashing into his neighbor's bedroom! He had to sell the car to pay for the repairs to the house!
Jerry
