K series exhaust manifold

[Alan Archer]

Cold somebody tell me the correct torque setting for the exhaust manifold on a k series please?

Alan 

[Jonathan Kay]

34 Nm according to the Assembly Guide.

Jonathan

[Alan Archer]

Thanks Jonathan.

Alan

[Nick Bassett]

If it helps - when I was at DVA he did them up tight by hand and used a fair amount of force - more than my inexperienced hands would have done (and did in fact when I fitted the exhaust). I mentioned this to him and his response was "they are very strong studs, so not too much to worry about"!

As an aside, when I first removed my original K manifold to fit the new 4-2-1 version, I was amazed at how loose the original nuts were done up - I applied so little pressure and even thought at first the socket had slipped off! I had owned the car for 6 years and had covered many thousands of miles at that point!

[Alan Archer]

Thanks Nick, that is interesting, when I was undoing mine yesterday they were very tight, I would be amazed if they were only tightened to 34 Nm. 

Alan

[Nick Bassett]

I'm certainly no expert Alan, but as long as you are careful, you can apply quite a bit of force to the exhaust nuts. The cap head bolt on the far right can bit a little tricky, but not too bad.

I had a slight blow from mine, so when Dave re-assembled my engine we used Loctite copper silicon RTV sealant around the exhaust gasket and it's been perfectly leak-free ever since.

[SM25T]

They seem to bind on to the studs in use. It is only an aluminium head ... so don't exceed the stated torque or you'll end up fitting helicoil inserts !