Rocker cover Bolt stripped Ej20g

[Paul888]

Hi all i've had an ongoing issue with a leaky rocker cover ( drivers side uk) bottom left bolt seems to keep working loose and hey presto two week later it starts dropping again. 

Long story short tried doing it up again this week and it's not taking won't do up so it's stripped. I know the normal process of Helicoil / Time sert but it's the bottom left bolt ( hardly any access) . 

Im not in the position to lower the subframe right now or willing to take the head off or engine out, im considering temporarily so i can use it for a few weeks or take it to a garage of bonding a stud thread in with a nut to tighten up on rocker cover . Any thoughts ? will it stay bonded with oil all over it ? is there enough room to get the cover off with a stud there ? 

Advice appreciated just thinking it through before the weekend .

Cheers 

 

 

Edited June 14, 2017 by Paul888
edit

[savage bulldogs]

If there's enough room, you Could try running a tap through it and using threadlock on the bolt ?

 

It would only be a temporary solution (if it works at all) but it might just nip it up a little bit for now .

 

 

[Paul888]

Cheers might give it a go but it's so tight getting a tap in there would be hard, even bought new bolts proper subaru ones but it just won't take. Need to investigate it more on the weekend . 

[Piggysniffer]

I read somewhere that someone had this problem, they had a machine shop make them another bolt with a 7mm thread instead of the 6 and wound that in there, now I'm not sure if they tapped it first, but you can actually turn the bolt thread itself into a tap for ally by putting two cuts in the thread wit a hacksaw, you generally can't stop a leaking gasket on these by tightening up the bolts once it's started leaking, I would imagine you would still have a leak even if you did the 7mm mod

oops, just seen the date of post, well hope this helps someone else, would like to know how op got on 

[Paul888]

Cheers Piggy . 

Well i cleaned out the thread with a tapper and tried again but no luck, so i tried a stainless bolt that was 5-6 mm longer and it turns out the thread in the head is longer than the oe bolts are,so i replaced the subaru bolt with an exact copy. 

I did this by adding a sleeve to the thread on the bolt so the original oil seals still work, then done up the bolt and as it's 5mm longer it does up, so this solved the problem.

However the other day a drop of oil was again leaking on the manifold causing smoke again ffs .Checked the bolts and the lower bolts are looser than they were, like they are working loose ( i did use medium threadlock) but obviously this isn't good enough so bought some high strength , which i'm going to use this week. Got to say the design on the ej20 rocker covers as far as sealing the gasket and oil is crap, stupid stuff spoils the rest of the car as it's been reliable as cars go.. 

I hope once i've used the threadlock that will be it it would be nice to drive without smoke appearing every so often . 

[Piggysniffer]

👍😁 didn't think of that mate, good idea with the longer bolt !! I had same prob on my 53 blob, bloodyb oil dripping on uppipe, luckily a deer wrote it if before I had to do the gasket 😝

[Paul888]

If mine doesn't seal soon i'll be looking for a similar end game lol .