sjlrunner

I just blew my hg at 167k. I was reading the manual and it said to take off the exhaust manifolds with the heads. Is this the procedure you all follow? Do the bolts or studs break off?

Also, where is the best source for the OEM head gasket? Is Felpro just as good?

Does anyone replace the knock sensor when doing this job?

Thanks

scope103

The exhaust manifolds aren't very long; about as long as the head. The tricky part is getting the nuts that attach to the exhaust pipe (you may need to lie under the truck using a fil of extensions to reach them) and the nuts that attach the exhaust cross-over (I recommend getting a 3/8" drive with a flex head; one with a bend in the handle is even better). You can get to the manifold bolts, but the manifolds won't move far enough to lift the head. [I had one manifold-to-exhaust nut that wouldn't let go; I had to unbolt the manifold and unbolt the exhaust at the cat, and then thread the assembly out. Not fun.]

Rocketwrencher

I am in the middle of the rebuild myself and was kind of confused about it myself. What I found out is that, with the manifolds bolted to the heads with studs and the crossover bolted to the manifolds at a 90 deg. it is impossible to pull the manifold off bolt of them. What I did was unbolt the down pipe from the drivers side manifold from underneath, unbolt the crossover from the drivers side manifold, pop the drivers side head off with the manifold, then remove the passenger side head with the manifold and crossover. As far as gaskets go, I went with toyota gaskets just because of some of the negative comments I have read on this site about felpro. They are not that much more expensive from what I understand. Regarding the one nut you cant break loose, heat it up with a bottle of map gas. You have to get it almost glowing hot. It will spin right off. Dont do this to the bolts on the manifold to the heads though. They are aluminum and could warp or crack.