head studs? Whats the best?
 

Whats the best head stud to get for a 6bolt? my arp's arent cutting it

Re: head studs? Whats the best?
 

I would try to figure out why its happening first, headstuds should not be an answer to remedy blowing headgaskets unless you have ALOT of power.

A. You have alot of power

B. You did not prep the head/block correctly

C. You are knocking alot for whatever reason

D. Headstuds were installed/torqued wrong

E. Headgasket installed wrong

F. Overheating and are not aware of it

Anyone else care to add to the list?

The best thing to do is figure out why its happening, but if you choose to skip this vital step then L19's paired with Fel Pro Permatorque headgasket seems to be the new trend as s working very well for many.

Re: head studs? Whats the best?
 

Best headstuds out there are A1's. Shep, Rau and others use them. But, they are quite expensive-I paid 200 for mine, but usually they cost around 600-660 a set. Also, they don't prevent things from happening..Rau blew out his headgasket on the friday evening, weekend of the MCSO, and I've never seen soo much damage to the studs or nuts till then. All they do is clamp the head down to the block..that's it. So, you gotta look at what happened..perhaps a better hg? keep in mind DSM's will push a little coolant under boost..

Re: head studs? Whats the best?
 

ARPs aren't the problem here. Good post from blacknova, pretty much sums it up.

Re: head studs? Whats the best?
 

dont have a blown headgasket. Under boost it does push coolant tho. Just trying to see whats better out there for studs. I guess they have different strength ratings, and wont strech as much as other.

just wondering whats the best out there or what there is i guess.

Re: head studs? Whats the best?
 

As far as I know, best to lest-best:
A1
ARP L19
ARP standard
Stock

Re: head studs? Whats the best?
 

Where did you get the information that dsm's will push coolant? Pushing coolant should not be an acceptable thing.

Re: head studs? Whats the best?
 

Why is it pushing coolant if you dont have a blown headgasket?

If you are worried about headstuds then whats going through your mind is our head raised, and if your head raised, your headgaskets is blown and is the culprit of pushing coolant.

Re: head studs? Whats the best?
 

Shane told me its rather common on dsm's he's seen on the dyno.

Re: head studs? Whats the best?
 

I have also heard its common from others.. and it says it here too..

http://www.extremepsi.com/store/cust...cat=555&page=1

Re: head studs? Whats the best?
 

Its not pushing coolant under normal driving. It doesnt get hot or anything. Its just under full throttle high boost it does.. if the head gasket were blown id think it would cause a problem during any driving condition?? but gathering from what I hear about heads lifting Im guessing its doing that. But I could be wrong. I didnt build the motor but when I have to take it apart I would like to know whats the best to use to put back in it. ;)

Re: head studs? Whats the best?
 

or you could have an imperfect sealing surface on the head/block. Composite gaskets are good at adapting to non-ideal surfaces.

Are you running a composite or steel HG?

Re: head studs? Whats the best?
 

I dont know, it is what was in there when I got it. Its a stock 6bolt. with ARP's. Dont know if its a stock HG or not.

Re: head studs? Whats the best?
 

I pushed coolant for months before my headgasket actually took a shit. Ya I drive an evo but its still basically the same. My problem was my head surface was not machined well enough for a cometic head gasket. Schiedes was also pushing some coolant for a while without any drivability issues. If you have the money, get some L19's or A1's and a oem mls gasket and call it good, but make sure and have your head checked out for flatness

Re: head studs? Whats the best?
 

Is that oem mls gasket good?

Re: head studs? Whats the best?
 

You'll still need some really really flat surfaces to use any MLS and not push coolant. I would just run a new oem composite gasket. Plenty of people have made 500awhp with them.

Re: head studs? Whats the best?
 

I was running a cometic gasket at around 450whp and I pushed coolant underboost and the minute I switched to the oem mls gasket, I stopped pushing coolant.

Re: head studs? Whats the best?
 

My car was doing a lot of what is being described here and I used a Cometic MLS on a freshly rebuilt motor, It would drive fine all day long for 200 miles, but as soon as I would get into the boost once or twice, the fucker would push out a bunch of coolant and wast to overheat. I'll be going to a Fel-Pro Permatorque and some L19's, many have used this combo after having the same issue with great success.

Re: head studs? Whats the best?
 

My engine also started pushing coolant like a mofo earlier this year. This was with a freshly shaven head / block, cometic HG, and std. ARP studs torqued to spec using moly. I've recently built a 2.4 with a Felpro permatorque and A1's. we'll see how this one works...

Re: head studs? Whats the best?
 

Pushing coolant IS a blown head gasket. It's just not blown enough to let coolant into the oil passages or into the cylinder. My car pushed coolant after about 15k miles on a Mitsu MLS gasket and regular ARP studs. Switched to an OEM composite gasket with a little copper spray and it's been fine ever since. OEM Composite gaskets can hold a lot more than people give them credit for.

Re: head studs? Whats the best?
 

Where do I find TQ specs for the ARP's? I wonder if mine could just be re TQ'd?

Re: head studs? Whats the best?
 

I beleive there 85 ft lbs.

Re: head studs? Whats the best?
 

He doesn't know much about his motor, he bought the car modded. He is running running over 30psi of boost. He isn't knocking.

Pushing coolant under high boost, high load, higher power is common with the DSM heads even with no knock/detonation. They are not as rigid as the Evo heads and are prone to flexing easier. L19/H11 head studs and good headgasket usually fixes this and sometimes even when you just slap them in like Brad did. The Mistu MLS gasket for DSM is not all that good, the Evo MLS is very good. I personally think that normal ARP head studs might be worse than stock head bolts, but I could be wrong. If they are better, they don't seem to help much at all.

When the head lifts on a DSM under high load, you push coolant and it goes back down and all is fine until you boost again and push more coolant, or you push enough to get a big air pocket and start overheating, or you warp your exhaust valve seats from doing it too much. You don't want to fill up your coolant overflow and have it overflow onto your tires though at 100mph. When your head lifts on an Evo it likes to blow freeze plugs out of your waterpump or block, makes a big mess.

Re: head studs? Whats the best?
 

30+psi for 50K miles on my stock HG and stock head bolts so far in the evo. no "Knock on wood"-alcohol!

Re: head studs? Whats the best?
 

ARP's are TTY (torque to yield) studs meaning they're designed to be torqued/stretched once and NOT reused unlike popular opinion states.

Re: head studs? Whats the best?
 

ARP's might be one time use studs, but I don't think they are TTY.

Re: head studs? Whats the best?
 

it's around 80 or 85 with moly lube and 120 with 30wt oil

I've looked around a bunch and haven't found any legit info on them actually being tty. I've looked on arp's site and other forums and all I've found is people saying they are tty nothing from the actual manufacturer sayin they are tty. Infact i've found more info saying you can reuse them if they are NOT stretched. I've even found posts where they talking to the arp people and they said they were reuseable if they are not stretched

I think half the problem is people over torque them and when you stretch a bolt too much it loses a lot of it's clamping ability.
so you have a weakend headstud in an engine making a lot of power and the head lifts and you push coolant. correct me if I'm wrong but thats just my thoughts on it.

on another note I'm running arp's and a commetic hg and haven't pushed any coolant since I've put them in almost a year ago, even on the dyno when I had it tuned on a spike to 25psi then settling to 21psi and making 280awhp at db. ( but I know i'm not making a ton of power so we'll see how things hold up).

Re: head studs? Whats the best?
 

I dont know if I agree on this, are you sure these high load conditions arent causing alot of thermal expansion of the coolant? Its what it sounds like to me, because if you raise your head far enough to move combustion into the coolant, your headgasket is junk.

Re: head studs? Whats the best?
 

Times have changed my friend ;)

A1 Technologies H11 / L19 6 Bolt Head Studs $254.99

Re: head studs? Whats the best?
 

Motor blew up tonight.. :( weak.. now on to 2.4 I guess

Re: head studs? Whats the best?
 

I'm sorry to hear that sir :( We are currently building about 8 different shortblock configurations for stock, let me know if you are interested...

Re: head studs? Whats the best?
 

Then you'd have to change your avatar.

Tough luck on the motor.

Re: head studs? Whats the best?
 

sucky dude. 2.4 ftw though. Time to upgrade turbo too!!

Re: head studs? Whats the best?
 

I may just do a 2.3 so I may not have to change the avatar?!? ;) Yeah I want to change the turbo but I may just try to get a new short block in and run this until next year as its already tunned (as of tuesday) :(

Re: head studs? Whats the best?
 

Hmm, My coolant overflow dump tube is front of my drivers tire...

I have a Mitsu OEM headgasket, and it works OK for about 30psi.

I have a previous car with a MLS gasket, and it would push coolant. I switched to the OEM, and it was fine! Truely flat surfaces are key.

Re: head studs? Whats the best?
 

Get your head decked, and block if possible. L19's and a mitsu multi layer head gasket and be done with it. I've been running that setup on my current car for many many miles. All this season I've been over 500awhp and have not pushed a drop of coolant. The cars never ran hot after a long hard pull, and I've been very happy with them(L19's).

Re: head studs? Whats the best?
 

Simply stated, pushing coolant may be common, but it's not acceptable, and it's not a good thing.

What you have to realize is that what is getting pushed into the coolant are extremely hot gasses which over time will eat away at the head gasket and make it worse, call it a snow ball effect. Some instances will have eroded the block and head in that area if its bad enough.

If the tune is good, then I would suggest better studs than what you have now. If I remember correctly, the basic ARP's are only good to about 30 psi anyway, so get something better like the A1's or ARP L19's. May cost a little more now, but will save you money in the long run.

Also, I wouldn't use Rau's blowing a head gasket as anything negative about the A1 studs, he runs extremely high boost and cylinder pressures on that motor and eventually somethings gonna let go. In most cases 2 to 3 times the boost most DSM'ers run on their street cars.

I have the A1 studs. Is it overkill? Who knows? I don't think so as I plan to run 35-40 psi at some point in the near future. Just one less thing to worry about for me.

Re: head studs? Whats the best?
 

I thought i should add that when someone says X headstud is good for Xpsi boost, this is a bit misleading.

What you should be thinking about is the pressure in the cylinder (bmep) which is an actual function of horsepower, as opposed to boost which is relatively meaningless in this case.

Re: head studs? Whats the best?
 

Torque is your cylinder pressure then based on RPM you get horse power. There would need to be a long list of X's to make a list of what is good for what.

~John

Re: head studs? Whats the best?
 

ARP's are just fine. I've used them and reused them more than once and have had no problems running 30+ psi. Like someone said, flat surfaces and a decent gasket are key, so is proper torque sequence and general care in putting things back together. From what I've seen on the other board, only the 750whp+ crowd is looking seriously at A1's. I doubt if that applies to many here.