'09 2.4 GEMA stripped head bolt

[ChewinBolts]

Hello! My name is JD & I am new to this forum. I searched it out because I am currently rebuilding my wife's 2009 2.4 liter engine. It was knocking, shuddering & doing some odd things so I stripped it down entirely. I found the rod bearings were severely worn, the head gasket was leaking oil to the outside, the main bearings had some wear, the cylinder walls have a bit of pitting, one of the camshaft cap bolts is broken & one is stripped, there was half a drill bit stuck in the crank case & all of the cylinders have burnt oil caked on the pistons/valves. 

 

I'm replacing all of the bearings, the entire head & piston rings. My problem is.. someone has had the head off of this engine before. Half of the holes are heli-coiled. They're deep head bolts so it's not easy to get to the threads where they need to be, so the previous person heli-coiled the top of the holes. I'm assumed it overheated in the past maybe? Idk. It seems to have worked.. half-arse. The head gasket was leaking oil to the outside of the block. I have one hole that is not heli-coiled & is stripped out. I've done some research & found that there's a tool called "NS300L" that's supposed to be for inserting these engines. I also found the Time-Sert 2200, but the Chrysler isn't listed as one of the engines it does, so I am not sure if it's long enough or not. 

 

My question is.. has anyone run in to stripped head bolt holes? If so, how did you fix it? Do you think a machine shop would do it? And, would you replace the head bolts themselves? Also, would you attempt to remove the heli-coils & insert the bottoms of all of them, if possible? I'm gonna call the machine shops tomorrow.

 

I apologize if there's already a thread but I did look & I couldn't find one. Thank you!

[2late4u]

welcome to the group and LOL no there isn't a thread on this question, sounds like you know what your doing way over my head,and i hope you find a fix to this problem maybe John will pipe in sooner or later ,,,good luck on your solution and also please let us know how it all turns out....

[John/Horace]

I’m pretty sure the bolts are torque to yield, so not reusable, here is a pasted clip from parts site.

 

• Torque-to-yield bolts are designed so that they can be elongated beyond their elastic limit into the plastic region without problems.
• When a specific tightening torque has been reached, the bolts are turned further through a defined angle, which pre-loads them into the plastic region. Consequently, no retorquing is necessary.
• Although it is a very effective means to get the maximum, uniform clamping load from each bolt, it permanently distorts the bolts, preventing them from being reusable under any circumstance.

Check with machine shops, but I don’t think he’ll-coils are good enough for cylinder head bolts. Too many heat cycles and the huge amount of labor rebuilding motor makes it not worth the risk. 

Get a reman long block or short block or better yet a complete good wrecker engine. They are a common engine used in a lot of vehicles.  LKQ or other reputable company.  Free advice worth everything you pay for it. Cheers.

[John/Horace]

Found a decent link talking about stripped head bolt repairs. Helicoil is mentioned as not as good as time sert thread repair on aluminum blocks.  But you need to have enough extra space for that style of repair.

 

https://www.e46fanatics.com/threads/torquing-head-bolts.1287951/

[ChewinBolts]

Update:

 

Because I know how annoying it is to find forum threads relevant to what I am looking for & see no resolution, here is what has transpired since I last posted.

 

I looked at LKQ, found an engine in N.C. that claimed to have 44k, could have had it shipped to me for just under $2k. I almost did it but I did some research & watched some YouTubes by people who bought junkyard engines whom had less than desirable results. 
 

I called the local machine shops, both of them told me that they believe that they could do it, as long as the previous heli-coil repair didn’t result in losing too much “meat” (I wanted them to insert them all).

 

We had been driving my mothers 23 y.o. Chevy. So I loaded the block up & headed for the machine shop! Literally just as we were about to turn in, my mother’s transmission went out & the Chevy lost all “go”. It was dead. 
 

$200 tow later.. I was frustrated. We went to a local car lot & she is now the new owner of a 2015 Cherokee 3.2 v6. ?

 

So, the engine is in a box on our living room floor. I have not given up, far from it! But we had to have reliable transportation. I’ll be taking the engine to the shop early next week & will update with pictures if they’re able to do it.