I know its good practice to change the head bolts when you do the head gaskets but do you have to change them? I am on a tight budget and when i add £150 for head bolts, £80 for spark plugs, £230 for a gasket/seal kit and approx £300-400 for skimmng, cleaning and lapping valves and £250 for tensioner set (mines are cracked) it turns into an expensive job.

 

80GBP for plugs? That's really steep.

The machine work seems kind of steep too. Especially if you really mean valve lapping.

Anyways, the TSB's say on warranty work, head bolts may be used twice. When a mechanic reuses them, he is supposed to mark them on the head with a punch mark.

If the plugs are ok, maybe you can get by on them for a while.

 

Yeah I thought it was steep too, £60-100 for plugs on ebay. Valve lapping is what i mean, they do a compression test on the heads to see if the heads are cracked or if the valves leak, then they disassemble, chemical dip, skim, lap and reassemble. They do a good job but it can be costly if they find any problems.

 

The reuse twice TSB is for the AJ6/AJ16 6 cylinder engine ONLY. That engine also has the reuse Main Cap bolts twice.

Here are the TSBs

bob gauff

 

You can re-use the head bolts, the £3-400 for the head skim and relap is not what I would call out of the way and £10 a plug is the going rate for Iridium plugs.

Something you don't mention is if it is a 4.0 or 4.2, if it is a 4.0 fit 4.2 metal head gaskets, they are much better and rarely let go, unlike the 4.0 composite type.

 

Glad you came along