ka24de head gasket issues [and more]

[king bee66]

i recently bought a cheapo head gasket kit on ebay, well it didnt go so well.  i followed the fsm to the letter, got it to fire and ended up leaking almost immediatly.  im going ahead and buying a felpro this time, my questions are: first, can i reuse the head bolts that came with the ebay kit? the motor was never really run never warmed.  and second  should i do the factory suggested" torque, torque, loosen, torque, 1/4 turn, 1/4 turn" sequence or should i just do a 2 step torque? i feel like the two 1/4 turns may have tripped me up causing me to not tighten it enough.

[oldschool90]

I would follow what the manual says. What I've been told about head bolts is that if in the torque specs it's a straight up torque number like 25, then 45, then 65ft/lb, it's similar to a regular bolt and can be reused. If you have a spec like 25,45, loosen, 25, 45, 1/4 turn 1/4 turn, it's a stretch bolt and cannot be reused because you've already stretched it (the 1/4 turns are to stretch it to the right load).

[king bee66]

What you say makes since, its just thatI've read suggestions on 240 forums to ignore the loosen part because its not needed and instead do a 2 step torque.

[Xnke]

I depends on the manufactured class of the bolt and your application. If your bolts will produce the proper clamping force with a simple two-step torqueing, then go for it.

 

If you don't know, then you'll either have to measure, or go with what the supplied instructions say to do.

[king bee66]

i had heard from different sources that they were not TTY,  i ultimately went with nissans suggestion to replace them. 

 

so now i get the head attached and everything is great,  i turn it by hand and it seems ok,  i started it up and the valves begin hitting the pistons.  i  had bought the rebuilt cylinder head from a reputable head dealer, so i hadnt thought to check if the height was still within factory specs.  it turns out that its about 1mm+ off stock, when the FSM only allows .2.  

 

i called them up and they are sending me another head and i can return the one i have when i get it.  they then told me that they would reimburse me for the cost of gasket and head bolts if when they receive the POS head it is indeed as bad as i say it was. 

 

my  new question is, the valves are obviously trashed, but thats not my problem, im worried about my pistons, how much abuse can stock ka pistons take?

[datzenmike]

I would check the cam timing. TDC on the exhaust stroke the intake is opening and the exhaust is closing so they are not at full lift also the pistons are dished. The KA24DE has 4 smaller diameter valves rather than one large diameter.

 

Not saying it can't happen it just seems odd to me.

[king bee66]

chain was reinstalled atat TDC on the intake stroke.  the factory timing marks lined up perfectly with the cam sprockets, the exhaust dowel was at a perfect 90 degrees, it was as close to this picture as you could imagine .  the timing was the first thing i double checked.  of course now you have me third guessing myself.  

 

the pistons are dished but not much,  are you suggesting that removing that much from a head wouldnt likely cause the valves to hit?  i mean, a .2mm tolerance is far cry from 1mm and that number considers the .2, i calculated the total removed from the stock height was a minimum of 1.3 mm.

[king bee66]

if i did something wrong id love to know what it was, so i dont make the mistake again