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Found something interesting while searching for the PN for the damn screws.. (it's 948-105-146-00 if anyone needs the #..)
Sounds very much like they had a problem - and there is a repair kit to save the valve cover. Drill/tap thread-insert. Bet it's covered in a tech bulletin somewhere.
Close. Its a special helicoil that is specifically formulated to avoid causing corrosion. From what I under stand a traditional steel insert would cause corrosion in the magnesium valve cover.
Hey all. I just replaced all my coils and plugs and put in new retention bolts into the valve cover. One of the bolts snapped while I tightened it - luckily it is at the front of the engine. Unfortunately I think I probably over tightened the other 7 bolts as well (although they did not break). Do you think I should go back and remove the 7 remaining bolts (that i over tightened) now and hand tighten new bolts in? Seems like they might come out a lot easier now rather than when i go to replace the plugs15K miles from now. BTW is there an actual Torque spec available for these bolts ?
You may want to replace all of them now - they're about $4/each. I use a 3" long wrench and make them just snug enough to hold the coil down - that's all they do - besides providing a threaded hole for the screws for the beauty covers to screw into. The actual torque is probably in in/lbs...
This happened to me, and it was enormously frustrating. It was the 2nd from the back on the driver's side, with an air conditioning pipe right in front of it, and the brake fluid reservoir behind that. I drilled and then snapped a screw extractor off in the hole. Then I ground that out with a carbide burr and a small angled die grinder, and drilled it with carbide bits with a 90 degree drill attachment. I ended up making the hole a bit too large to effectively thread. I gently screwed the new bolt in (I had purchased 8 new bolts from the dealer), and although it's loose, like others have noted, the black cover that goes over the coil packs will hold everything down, and the coil packs themselves grab onto the spark plugs pretty tightly, so I doubt anything is going to move.
If I had to do it all over again, I would remove the valve cover, and extract the bolt on a workbench, so that I could make sure my drill hole was centered and aligned to the right angle. It's a pain to take the valve cover out, but less pain than trying to work on the broken screw in place. The valve cover is magnesium, and although I don't know much about the alloy used, pure Magnesium, and some alloys burn. I wouldn't want to try any welding around magnesium, even with TIG. You also need to be really careful with magnesium dust that you create when you try to drill out the aluminum bolt, but get some of the surrounding magnesium.
Many have commented that these bolts come out real easy. Most do, but they can get absolutely bonded in place. Use caution with screw extractors. Don't use too much torque on an extractor or break it and end up with a bigger problem. Better to just drill out the aluminum and re-tap the hole. The trick is to make sure you drill in the absolute center of the bolt, and at the right angle. If you're doing it in place, you can use an old coil pack as a guide. I would make a steel ring that fits in the aluminum ring of the coil pack, with an ID the same as your drill, to keep it centered and aligned.
01-10-2019, 08:54 PM
