bluebeastsrt

I agree about those washers. I also used ARP bolts and the washers they sent me were flat washers with the small chamfer on the side the bolt head rides up against.

NickP87

I guess I'm going to contact ARP then. Kinda blown because this is my only day off this week & I'll be out of town next week.

89LX Coupe

Sorry about all your bad luck man! but those washers that you have are the ones that would be for heads that go on a 351 that use the bigger head bolts and it's a washer/spacer for it to work on a 302 as well. I received the same same washer when I got my arp bolts but those washers was not needed for my heads.

NickP87

That's what my buddy just told me. It would have been nice if AM said something on their site or if ARP put something in their directions that said not to use the washers on a 302.

89LX Coupe

I know man man it does suck, what I ended up doing was going to the local hard wear store and getting chrome molly washers that was the same thickness as those and cost me a total of like $1.50.....

So new gasket maybe a new head and another set of washers then roll on.

NickP87

Reading over the description on the website it says "Application. This Ford Racing Head Bolt Kit is for installing stock 351W, Ford Racing cast iron or Ford Racing aluminum heads on a 289 or 302 block."

I guess it's my fault for not realizing that it was for 351W racing heads; not 351w, 302 ford racing cast iron, or 302 ford racing aluminum heads. I saw the fitment & assumed they were good for all 5.0s.

I'm trying to find someone local that has stock, gt40, or gt40p heads for sale right now.

NickP87

I have a friend that's heading to a junkyard on Saturday & he's going to pick up a set of GT40P heads & an intake for me if they have any.

I was too blown after realizing I had to undo all of my hard work & start over almost from the beginning to get it torn back down again. I did put the valve covers on (without gaskets) and I turned the motor over by hand. The rockers didn't hit the valve cover so it looks like there isn't going to be a clearance issue now that the baffle is out.

Next time I get a chance I'll pull the heads off & pull the valve train out of it. The center section of the exhaust valves was blue with a gold band so I'm wondering if it has some kind of after market valvetrain on it.

As for the oil- I just change it every 3 months (roughly 2k miles) because it starts to burn a lot of oil after that. Just use whatever is on sale at Autozone at the time.

Venomantidote95

If you dont want to look or run around or reorder any other parts just go to a machine shop and have your heads drilled for the inserts and be done! shouldnt be that much!

NickP87

Would that fix the cracks? The reason I didn't say "screw it" and just try to run the car is there are a couple of small chunks that are barely holding on & I'm afraid that if I try running the car the vibrations & expansion would cause the pieces to fall off.

The GT40Ps should only be about $100 & the guy I found on CL has E7s for only $40. I work through Sunday & then I'll be out of town until next Saturday so I guess I have time to think things over & see what becomes available.

NickP87

I'm supposed to be meeting the guy with the E7s tomorrow after work. The washers are bent out of shape & it will take me hours to file them off just to reuse the bolts so I'm just going to get VICTOR REINZ bolts from RockAuto for now. Kinda bitter to have blown $100 on a set of bolts I can't even use.

Either this evening or tomorrow I'll get a valve spring compressor